It's a frakked up universe!
by JCB
Summary: Last chapter posted! This is my first attempt at a BSG fic so please be gentle! Starts off after the end of season 1, looking at Adama's relationship with Lee and Kara. Will become L&K with some Cylon asswhopping action thrown in!
1. Default Chapter

**Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters; I'm only borrowing them for a while**

**Spoilers: Set after the end of season 1, so anything before that is far game**

**Rating: T (but likely to change in future chapters)**

**It's a frakked up universe!**

**Chapter 1**

Lee Adama watched the rhythmical rise and fall of his father's chest as the machines worked to keep him alive. The doc seemed to think it was a miracle that he'd made it this far. His heart had stopped twice but the medics had managed to get him back. When Lee had asked how he was doing after the surgery to remove the bullets, major Cottle had just said that he was "holding his own". Lee suspected that this was just the major's way of saying that he didn't have the slightest idea which way things were going to go.

Lee reflected that he never wanted to live through another day like the last one as long as he lived. His career was in tatters, Kara was gone and his father's life hung by a thread. It could only get worse if the old man…. he just didn't want to even think about it. He stood and stretched muscles that protested at the exertion after sitting for too long. His shoulder ached where he had taken out one of the marines who had tried to keep him from following the medical team taking his father from the CIC to sickbay. Fortunately major Cottle had come to his aid and diffused the situation by telling Tigh that he may need to take some of Lee's blood for the commander, so the colonel had let him go and had left him in the sickbay since. He'd posted marine guards around the sickbay; whether that was to keep Lee in or any Cylon agents out, Lee didn't really care if it let him remain at his father's side rather than being locked in the brig. He sat down again and resumed his watchful waiting. The strain of the day started to get to him and his head nodded onto his chest as he gave in to the exhaustion.

Sometime later he was jolted awake by various alarms and bleeps going off from the equipment around his father. The medical staff came running as he looked across at his dad, fear gripping his heart. He just wanted the chance to make things right between them. He wasn't a particularly religious man, but he believed enough to be certain that he couldn't bare the thought that his father might leave this life and enter the next thinking his son a mutineer who cared nothing for him. After what seemed like an age Cottle turned to him, a slight smile on his face

"Well this is a good sign"

"It is?" Lee asked, finding it hard to believe that all this commotion could be good

"Yes, he's making an effort to breath on his own. We can take him off the respirator and see how he does"

The actual moment when the machine was turned off was very tense. Lee held his own breath while the machines bleeped rapidly a few times and then evened out into a regular rhythm. There was a collective sigh of relief around the room.

And so started the vigil that would last much longer than he expected. People came and went but no once could persuade him to leave. Colonel Tigh came into the room at some point and stared long and hard at Lee. Lee met his gaze without blinking or looking away and the colonel nodded, seeming to accept that he should stay where he was, at least for the time being. The first time his father had awoken, Lee hadn't said anything, just held a glass of water to his cracked lips and dribbled some water into his mouth so the commander could slake his thirst.

"Lee, what are you doing here?" Lee couldn't believe that these were his father's first words. Was he going to order him to the brig? But the commander's next words caused a worry of a different kind.

"Where's your mother? Where's Zac?"

"Umm, they're not here right now, dad. It's just me" he seemed satisfied with this reply and drifted back to sleep. Lee was really worried that his brain had been damaged by the blood loss and lack of oxygen, but Cottle reassured him that it was probably just the meds that they were giving him. He came in and out of consciousness several more times, each time for a little longer as the doctor started to reduce down the sedating pain medication. About 3 days after the successful surgery he was able to wake for a considerable period and have a sensible conversation. This didn't make him more amenable to being poked about by the doctor when it came to checking on his dressings. As Cottle finally finished his latest examination a last grimace of pain crossed Adama's features.

"What on earth did you do to me major? My gut hurts like hell!"

"Sorry Bill, had to fish around quite a bit to get the bullets out and they did make rather a mess of a couple of organs."

"Thanks, that was more information than I really needed" he rested his head back on the pillows with a sigh

"I'll up the pain meds a bit more"

"No, I don't want too much. I need to start keeping more alert. Besides Lee thinks they make me cranky" he winked at his son who smiled at this sign of returning life in his father

The doctor left and Adama turned to look at his son. He felt they'd put off "the" conversation long enough

"Come here, Lee" Lee pulled his chair closer to the bed and took his father's hand.

"Well, son, when you do loose control and follow your instincts you certainly do it in style" he chose as his opening gambit

"We don't need to talk about his now, dad. When you're better, yes, but not now"

"No let's do it now. I haven't got anything better to do except lie here and you know if we put it off we may just ignore it completely and hope it will go away rather than address it. That's what you and I have been doing since the day you were old enough to first talk back to me. I won't let that happen again" Lee thought for a moment about what he should say. He needed to be careful not to anger his father in his current state of health, but he too wanted nothing but to clear everything up between them.

"I wasn't taking the president's side, dad. I hate that I seem to have been used as a pawn between the two of you. I wasn't taking any particular side, I was just doing what I thought was right to uphold the colonial law and maintain order in the fleet. My personal view is that you both made questionable decisions, which is completely understandable considering the immense strain you've both been under since the destruction of the colonies, but I was the one on the ground who had to deal with the consequences." He paused for a moment and glanced at his father who was looking at him with that intense unreadable stare of his. He didn't appear outwardly angry so Lee decided that he had to plough on and get everything off his chest.

"In the end you are my commanding officer and I am accountable to you. If you want to court martial me for pulling a weapon on a senior officer and disobeying orders then that's up to you in your capacity as my CO and I'll abide by your decision and accept any punishment the court gives me, but as my father don't hold the fact that I don't agree with everything you say and do against me. It…..It doesn't mean that I don't respect you"

"I don't hold it against you son. I told you to loose control and follow your instincts and that's what you did. I can't fault you for following my advice. I just wish you'd picked something a bit less dramatic to start loosening up on! My only concern with your arguement is that I expect the same courtesy in return." Lee didn't even pretend not to understand this reference to the treatment he had meted out to his father after his brother's death.

"Don't think I don't realise it. I've been…..judgemental in the extreme. My only excuse is that I'd never had to handle anything like Zac's death before and I just seemed to focus all my rage and guilt at you because you seemed to accept it so stoically. I didn't see the emotion that was underneath until after I came here to Galactica and spent time with you again." Lee took a deep breath as if to compose himself and looked up at his father, his eyes bright with emotion

"I would have done anything in my power to stop Boomer if I'd had the chance. I…I don't want to loose you again, dad" It was the closest he could get to admitting that he loved his father

"It works both ways son. Having you here with me has been the biggest reason making me get through this. For what it's worth, on reflection I think you did the right thing. I won't be pressing for a court martial, but I don't know what Saul will want to do."

Lee nodded and grasped his father's hand a little tighter. The commander returned the pressure and they remained that way in contented silence for a few minutes, each thinking through what had been said, oblivious to the sounds of the sickbay outside the room.

"We must try and talk like this more often. I don't want to have to wait until the next time either of us almost dies before we do it again"

"You just try and stop me, sir" Lee replied with a grin. Their conversation had tired the commander and he drifted off to sleep, but his face was relaxed for once and he hadn't taken his hand out of Lee's grasp. Lee was content that they had made the first steps towards a better understanding in the future, which was so important now that he was sure that they were going to have one.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

William Adama came awake slowly. For the first time in what felt like forever this process was not associated with intense pain, just a dull ache in his gut. He blinked a few times as his eyes adjusted to the dim light. He turned to his right but the chair by his bed was empty. His memory of the time since he had been shot was hazy at best, but the one thing that he did remember was that every time he had awoken before now his son had been sitting in that chair. He remembered that he had finally had a heart to heart conversation with his boy.

"Lee?"

"He's not here right now" said a familiar voice to his other side. He turned slowly to see Kara Thrace sitting on the other side of his bed with tears streaming down her face.

"Do I look that bad?"

"No" she snivelled "It's just, I'm very glad to see you, sir" her voice came out all squeaky through the tears. She coughed to clear her throat, sniffed and wiped her sleeve across her face to dry it. The commander thought she looked about twelve. She also had a couple of the biggest shiners he'd ever seen.

"I see you had some fun on your little trip. When did you get back?"

"A few hours ago."

"Did you get it?"

"Yes I did. You know I always like to successfully complete my missions" she replied with the ghost of a smile. "I also found Helo sir, and…and another Boomer." She didn't really want to remind him of Boomer right at the moment but it had to be said. He just nodded

"There was bound to be more of them." After a few moments of silence the commander asked about his son

"Where's Lee?"

"He's organising the mission to Kobol, sir, to rescue the team down there. With you here and the XO in charge of the ship, that leaves Lee as the highest executive officer. They tell me that he wouldn't leave you at all before now, even took on a couple of marines when they tried to take him to the brig, which I really wished I'd seen, but now you're out of danger and I've brought the arrow back, Colonel Tigh wouldn't let him put off getting back to work any longer"

"Quite right. He is still the CAG after all"

"Is he? I understand there was a question of mutiny, sir" Kara would have given her eye teeth to have seen Lee pull that gun on Tigh. Who would have thought that the Captain with the rule book shoved up his ass would have done anything so magnificently outrageous.

"We've all done a few questionable things in the stress of the last weeks"

Kara decided to leave it at that. It sounded like the commander at least was prepared to forget Lee's actions on Colonial One, although whether the same could be said for Tigh, only time would tell. There was also the matter of her own recent fall from grace (yet again!) that she needed to straighten out. She took a deep breath. He looked so tired and gaunt that she knew she shouldn't bring this up now, but she had to make it right between them again.

"I'm really, really sorry, sir. I…I wasn't thinking straight when I left, and I had no idea my leaving would frak things up so badly here. I had a lot of time to think about it on the way back here and I understand now why you said what you did about earth. I know I should have taken that time to think before going off and doing something so stupid. I should have trusted you more"

"Shh, let's not talk about that now. There were mistakes on both sides in this case. We all do and say things we regret. I don't regret giving people the hope of earth, but I do regret not realising how serious the president was about getting the arrow and I also regret over-reacting to your leaving and sending the troops onto Colonial One. But you can't let these things rule you, you just have to learn from them, let them go and move on." He reached out and she took his hand. She held it tightly as if by doing so she could transfer some of her strength to him. She laid her cheek onto their joined hands. He lay back and closed his eyes, drinking in the comfort that her presence always brought him. He knew that he shouldn't let her get off so lightly, but in truth he could never stay angry with her for long and in his present circumstances it just didn't seem worthwhile to prolong any estrangement. He knew she was full of remorse, not for what she had done, but for what she had done to him. He understood her so much better than his own son and right now he needed the uncomplicated father-daughter-like love that they shared. He let the silence that enveloped them both wash over him and each one was once again at peace with the other.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

The next time the commander awoke it was to find Lee in his usual seat, but wearing his flight suit.

"Well I see you're dressed for action. What's the plan?"

"I'm not supposed to tell you. Doc's orders. He doesn't want you agitated," his son replied with a wry smile.

"So does this mean that you've you taken my following your instincts advice to new extremes or is this a crazy Starbuck special?" Lee's smile faded at the mention of Starbuck.

"Neither, sir. It's just a straight forward rescue mission."

"Come down off of your high horse Apollo. What's up?"

"I gather you've seen Kara, dad." He seemed to be struggling with some strong emotion. Adama just looked at him so he went on. "How can you so easily forgive her? Why are you always so easy on her and so hard on me?"

"Because, as much as Kara is special to me, you are my son, my flesh and blood. I somehow expect more of you. If I'm hard on you it's because you've always seemed to thrive on being pushed hard. May be I've been wrong all these years son, but in truth I don't know any other way to be with you."

"It's OK dad. It's not you, it's her. She just seems to have this ability to make me angry. We're….we're not on the best of terms at the moment."

"I don't understand it, son. You used to be so close."

"I know, but she did something that I can't forgive, at least not yet, and then I said things to her that she'll probably never forgive. Don't worry about us, dad, we'll figure it out eventually."

"She's not going with you?"

"No, she's still recovering from the injuries she received on Caprica and…. and I've grounded her anyway. You may be able to forgive and forget, but as her CO I won't let her fly with the rest of squadron until she's convinced me that she can be trusted again not to go off and do something crazy that puts the whole team at risk. She needs to understand that the whole fleet doesn't revolve around her."

He stared at his father, a challenge in his eyes. William Adama had a pretty good idea what lay behind Lee's anger at Starbuck, but he didn't push it any further. The boy needed to work out his feelings for himself.

"You said it son, you're her CO. It's up to you who you take on this mission and how you handle your pilots. Good luck Captain!"

"Thank you, sir."

Lee stood up, came to attention and saluted his father before leaving the room at a jog. The commander watched his departing back and hoped he would work through his hostility towards Starbuck without them killing each other. He sighed; his children always seemed to make life so difficult for themselves, and by association, for him, but he needed to move on to deal with other matters.

"Come on in Saul." His XO appeared from behind the curtain where he had been waiting whilst the commander finished his conversation with Lee.

"So are you going to press charges against him?"

"No. By the Gods I want to but I can't afford to loose him at the moment. We've had a full and frank discussion about the incident and he knows that if he ever pulls something like that again I'll have his hide in the brig before you can say 'court martial'. He's accepted that and we're OK, just!"

"Thank you Saul. That's a weight off my mind"

"The kid's really screwed up, Bill. There just seems to be so much anger in him."

"I know, and don't think I don't know where the blame lies for that, but at least we're starting to work our way through it. Although I also think quite a lot of it revolves around Kara."

"Ahh, Starbuck. I wondered when we'd get around to her."

"I know, my other 'soft spot'. Are you throwing her in the brig with the president?"

"No, I'm letting Lee manage her as he seems even angrier with her than I usually am! I'm also letting the president go back to Colonial One, but with a military guard."

"Purely for her protection of course?"

"Of course! We have to let her take back control of the government, Bill. That damned Zarek is out there, talking to anyone with a microphone about military coups and stirring up unrest. We'll have the whole fleet in uproar if we don't let someone take control of the civvies and, much as I hate to say it, the only one that can do it is her."

Adama nodded in reluctant agreement. Tigh went on,

"We agreed that Lee would no longer be her advisor. I've told her that if she wants advice about the military she can come to me."

"Now this I'd like to see!"

"Yes, well she wasn't very happy about it, but she agreed."

I bet I know someone else who wasn't very happy about it, thought Adama. Flirting and more with other men had always been perfectly acceptable behaviour for Ellen, but woe betide Saul if he should even look at another woman. Then again, Ellen would probably make as much hay as she could from calling her husband the personal advisor to the president.

"Roslin's sick, Bill, really sick."

"I was beginning to suspect as much."

"She didn't tell me out right, but Elosha pretty much told me that it was terminal. Lords know what we'll do if she dies before the elections. Zarek will have a field day. They want to take this arrow thing that Starbuck brought back down to Kobol once Lee's team has secured the planet and ensured that it's Cylon-free and I don't really have the heart to stop her."

"Yes, let them do it. If the people see that we are cooperating with this plan it may hopefully stop the unrest. I'll see if I can get any more information from Cottle about how long she's got. I know she's been seeing him, but he's surprisingly hot on patient confidentiality when in comes to non-military personnel."

"Starbuck told you about the other Boomer?" Adama nodded. "Not sure what to do with this one. It claims to be pregnant with Helo's child. Doc confirms the story but has no idea of the mechanics of a human-cylon pregnancy. It's sick if you ask me. Helo's so screwed up about it he doesn't know his ass from his elbow at the moment."

"Is it violent at all?"

"No. I can't figure her..er, it out, but it seems to genuinely have feelings for Helo and the child"

"Let's keep her alive for the time being and see what happens."

"And the other one?" Tigh let the question hang in the air. The commander looked grim.

"Give her a weapon and let her finish off properly what she tried to do to herself before she shot me."


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

After leaving his father, Lee made his way down to the hanger bay to complete the pre-flight checks on the raptor he was taking to Kobol. Until they knew whether the Cylons were still there, they didn't want to jump the Galactica to the planet, so a raptor, with its FTL capability, was the only option. He'd feel a hell of a lot more comfortable in a viper with its guns at the ready, but he had no choice.

Helo was already there. Lee had decided that the best thing that he could do for Helo was to get him back into a plane and back to some sort of normality as soon as possible, so he was taking him as his ECO. The young lieutenant seemed inordinately grateful and was diligently ploughing through all of the pre-flight checklists.

Whilst he was doing his tour of the outside of the plane, Lee glanced across at Kara's raider and the small transport Helo and the new Boomer had returned in. He would have to get the whole story at some point, but now wasn't the time. As if reading his thoughts, Kara appeared beside him.

"Captain Adama, sir. What's all this crap I hear about you grounding me, sir?"

"It's not crap Lieutenant. You're grounded until the docs and I clear you for flight duty," he replied in a clipped voice. He avoided looking at her and appeared to study the checklist in his hand.

"You're so full of bullshit, Apollo. You need me on this mission, you know you do."

"No, lieutenant, I don't." Lee finally looked at her, his eyes sparkling like hard flint. "What I need is pilots who play by the rules and work for the good of the team, not for their own personal agendas."

It was as if he had slapped her. So far her return to Galactica had not been as bad as she had anticipated. Sure, bad things had obviously happened whilst she had been away, but she had made peace with the commander, Tigh seemed minded to ignore her and the president was jubilant that she had retrieved the arrow. It was obvious, however, that Lee neither forgave her for the indiscretion with Baltar, nor could forget the humiliation of having her bug out on him with no warning in the middle of an exercise.

"Look Lee, I know you're frakked off with me, but I'm not going to do anything stupid again."

"So, you're admitting that what you did was stupid?"

"No…you're putting words in my mouth. All I'm saying is that you can trust me in the air, just like you've always been able to in the past."

"Well, that's the crux of the matter isn't it Kara? I don't trust you at the moment, in the air or out of it, and until I do you're not getting near this mission or any other. You can't just frak off back to Caprica and come back expecting everyone to welcome you with open arms just because you've brought back some rusty old relic. I want proof that you want to be part of this team, Kara, not just the high value player that gets all the glory."

With that he turned sharply on his heal and climbed in to the raptor.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

Apollo eased the raptor out of its FTL jump and looked at the shining blue and green planet below him. The view caused an unexpected stab of longing for Caprica and home: it certainly looked like one of the old colonies. Fortunately, he was getting a view of the planet uninterrupted by any Cylon base star or raiders.

"What do you see, Helo?"

"Uhh, nothing as yet, sir. Wait….picking up life signs near the location of the old city, sir. That must be them. No indication of Cylon presence."

"That's good. Let's just do a bit more recognisance before we land."

As the skies above the planet seemed clear, they took the raptor down into the atmosphere. They landed near the ruins of the old temple; Apollo couldn't think of it as anything other than the Caprica City opera house. Almost immediately they found the camp set up by the survivors around their downed raptor.

"Don't take this the wrong way sir, but I've never been more glad to see you," Chief Tyrol addressed himself to the Captain.

"No offence taken, chief. I'm very glad to have found you too. Not sure my viper would be the same without your tender loving care! Although this raptor of your looks like Crash lived up to his name and did a bit of a number on it. Is it salvageable?"

"I think I can repair it enough to get back to Galactica, sir. The biggest problem is the windshield."

"Well Helo's getting ready to make a transmission back to Galactica. Give him a list of the things you need and we'll get them sent with the civvy ship."

"Civvies are coming here?"

"Yes, the president and the priest, Elosha, want to look at the ruins," Apollo replied guardedly. He didn't want too much discussion about the arrow and the search for the way to earth.

"With all due respect sir, not sure that's a good idea. We've already got Dr Baltar here, running around the place, acting crazy."

"What, crazier than usual?" Apollo asked with a wry grin.

"No I suppose not. I was just hoping to get back to the ship as quickly as possible, not wait for some civvy site-seeing tour. The Cylon raiders all bugged out after the base star was destroyed, but they could be back at any time. How did the commander manage to get it blown up, by the way?"

This question reminded Lee that the chief knew nothing about Sharon being a Cylon, the fact that she'd shot the commander and that another version of her had had a relationship with Helo. This was definitely something he did not want to get into right now; better to leave the poor man in ignorance until they got back to Galactica. He'd let Tigh or his dad deal with this one. He made a mental note to also brief Helo to keep his mouth shut as he put a hand on the man's shoulder.

"Now that's a long story, Chief and definitely one for another day." He wanted to turn the Chief's mind to something else. "I'm with you on getting back to the ship asap. We'll just let the civvies do their thing whilst the repairs to the raptor are carried out. Is its FTL drive still working?" This was a successful tactic as the chief launched into an intricate description of the FTL system on a raptor.

−−

A small transport ship appeared sometime later. Out of it came the president, naturally followed by the ever diligent Billy, Elosha and, much to the chief's joy, a couple of his deck crew carrying all the spare parts that were needed. Finally, to Crash's more hidden joy, Ensign Davis, who had been chosen to pilot the shuttle, and who immediately began to fuss over the lieutenant's various cuts and bruises.

"Well Captain Apollo, it's good to see you and good be on the ground again," the president said as she walked across to him. This was the first time that they had seen each other since the incident on Colonial One. He still held her responsible for Kara's desertion, but wasn't going to hold that one bad decision against all the good things that she had done since she had been thrust into the role as their leader.

"It's good to see you too, Madame President. I expect this view is much better than the one from the Galactica's brig!"

"Yes, well it was an interesting experience and, as a teacher, I'm all for learning from new experiences! I haven't thanked you for what you did that day; you've had more pressing matters on your mind. I'm so glad your father is going to be OK."

He looked at her sceptically.

"No, I meant it, I really am glad, Captain. The fleet needs him; I need him. He may not always get it right dealing with a civilian government, but I somehow feel safer knowing he's there in command of the Galactica. I also feel better knowing that you're there with him." He nodded in acceptance of what he recognised as a somewhat veiled apology and the recognition that his loyalties must lie in his position as Galactica's CAG, not as her advisor.

They walked together in relatively companionable silence, following Elosha as she headed towards the ruined temple.

As she walked the priest took a good look around her, taking in her surroundings. A look of surprise on her face, she turned back to speak urgently with Roslin.

"Are you seeing what I'm seeing Madame President?"

"I don't know Elosha, just looks like an over grown ruin to me."

"Yes, but the plants. They look very like kamala plants, only different, larger."

The president really examined the landscape they were walking through for the first time; what Elosha said was true. Just one type of large plant seemed to be growing in the meadow around the temple, its growth an antithesis of the destruction around it.

"Do you think this could be the plant from which what we know as kamala originated? Perhaps the source of its properties?"

"It's distinctly possible and at this stage Madame President, I shouldn't think there is any harm in you trying."

Lee looked at Laura sharply at Elosha's comment. He realised that he had forgotten about her illness in the pressures of the last weeks. Looking at her now he noticed for the first time how thin she had become and how the strain of fighting a very private battle against a deadly disease was etched onto her face.

"I'll have someone dig one of the plants up. We should get Dr Baltar to take it back and analyse its properties."

"Thank you, Captain." Laura quickly dismissed talk of something she'd really rather forget about at the moment. "Now what I really came to see was this temple."

They walked inside the ruins and started to explore.

"What exactly are we looking for?" asked Apollo, ever practical.

"I really have no idea. I just know that there is something important here."

Suddenly Billy started rushing around, pulling debris away from the centre of the main chamber.

"Er..what are you doing Billy?"

"Don't you see it, Madame President? It's a star chart, a representation of a solar system. This represents the sun," he pointed to a large, raised stone circle in the middle of the area, "and these are the planets in its orbit." He had uncovered three other circles, one a series of multiple rings.

"By the Gods, I think you're right Billy. Are there any more?"

They all began to frantically pull away at the accumulated rubble, weeds and undergrowth. Eventually the area was cleared and they could identify at least nine planets revolving around the sun.

"Do you think one of these is earth?" Apollo asked, awe-struck at what they had found. He had been sceptical about this whole re-enactment of the scripture thing, but now he started to get caught up with the excitement of the others.

"Yes I do. The question is which one?"

"I have it," said Elosha. She pulled the arrow of Apollo from her robe and bent down to examine the main 'sun' stone. Running her fingers around the edge she found an aperture. She positioned the arrow over this hole and pushed it in; sure enough it fitted perfectly.

They stood back: the arrow of Apollo was pointing directly to the third planet in the system.

−

The two raptors and the transport slowly rose out of the atmosphere of Kobol, in preparation for the jump back to Galactica, but what they found there made some of the occupants gasp in fear. The skies that had been so clear when they had arrived were now filled with a Cylon base star. Another jumped in as they watched the first disgorge any number of raiders.

"Oh holy shit. How long till we can all jump, Helo?" Apollo swore profoundly under his breath. The excitement of finding the solar map in the temple had made him drop is guard, even though it was apparent that the Cylons were only just arriving.

"It'll be at least 2 minutes sir."

"This will be all over by then." He radioed the other ships, "you two keep back and let me handle this. Just jump as soon as you can."

He swung the raptor around to place it between the raiders and the other ships and started dodging the fire from the nearest raiders. What he wouldn't give for a squadron of vipers right now, in fact he'd settle for the firepower of just one, which would certainly be better than none at all; they really had to do something about arming the raptors. All he could do was evasive manoeuvres to draw the raiders away from the others and hope he could last until they could jump. He was also acutely aware that he had passengers. The vice president was whimpering in fear at the back of the ship, clinging onto Cally in what he thought was a quite unnecessary fashion. Another raider jumped in, seemingly from nowhere. It was much closer than the others and headed straight for the raptor. He thought that his luck had run out.

Then suddenly an unexpected voice came over the radio.

"Need a little assistance, Apollo? I was really busy polishing up my MVP awards, but then I thought, what the heck, the CAG has probably gotten himself into a spot of bother again; I might as well help out, you know, give my Cylon toy a bit of a run out!"

"Starbuck," Apollo shouted in relief, "I hate to say it but I can't remember the last time I was so frakking pleased that you disobeyed orders."

"I think that would be since the last time I saved your sorry ass… sir!"

"Yeah, well never mind that now, just get on with it. It's good just to see a raider with your name on it."

He watched as her raider waltzed away, taking out any number of its supposed comrades in its path.

"Ready for the jump sir."

"Thank the Lords, Helo. Let's get out of here people. Starbuck that means you too."

"Already on it sir."

Lee pressed the buttons and the raptor shot into its FTL jump back to Galactica. He was finally able to relax slightly. He realised that he was almost beyond tired. This mission, culminating as it had with a near fatal run in with the Cylons, had come on the back of many days with virtually no sleep spent at his father's bedside. He closed his eyes briefly and rested his head back against the headrest. A loud cough in his ear made him look around into the eyes of Gaius Baltar. He was the last person Lee wanted to speak to at the moment and it must have shown in his face.

"I know very well why you're looking at me like that Captain and quite frankly I don't think that I deserve such censure." He paused, placed his hands together and then rested the tips of his fingers under his chin before continuing. "When I cut in for that dance at the Colonial Day party I wasn't aware that you had any prior claim on Lieutenant Thrace."

"I hadn't, still don't," Lee mumbled in reply, a sour look on his face. He had no idea why Baltar had chosen this, of all moments to have this discussion. He had noticed the overly studied move with the hands and couldn't help but think that this guy was just such a jerk. He again wondered what Starbuck had ever seen in him.

"Well you could have fooled me. It wasn't me she wanted, but you. She made that all too painfully clear to me!"

"So you didn't sleep with her?" Lee couldn't resist asking.

"Well, no, I did sort of sleep with her, but she certainly didn't sleep with me."

"huh?" This made no sense to Lee at all.

"That's all I'm saying. You're an intelligent man. I'm sure you can work the rest out for yourself without me having to humiliate myself further. If you can't, why don't you ask the lieutenant to explain it to you?"

Baltar moved away to the back of the ship feeling extremely virtuous that he had done his bit towards improving military relations and leaving Lee staring off thoughtfully into space.

−

When they landed back on Galactica, they were met with jubilation. The return of the lost raptor crew was indeed something to celebrate. Kara leapt out of her raider and stood smirking at Apollo as he climbed wearily out of the raptor. He came to stand in front of her, a look of resigned exasperation combined with reluctant admiration on his face.

"Lords, but you have your moments, Kara. You're the most annoying, insubordinate, stubborn, frakked up pilot it's ever been my misfortune to work with. But there is still no one else I'd rather have beside me in a fight, either in a viper or a raider." She gave him her trademark grin.

"I love you too Lee! I take it that I'm not grounded anymore?"

"I don't think I've got the strength to try," he replied.

He placed a hand on her shoulder and gave it a slight squeeze. It wasn't an intimate gesture, but a sign of thanks from one pilot to another. It wasn't what Kara wanted but she thought perhaps that it was a start.

"Thanks, Kara," he said in a weary voice

"You're welcome, Lee. Course you know I only did it because if you didn't come back they might make me do your job; still not a big enough dipstick for it!" He gave her that 'don't push it' look of his.

"Talking of my job, I'd better go and fix the rosters if you're going to be back in them."

"Hey, Mr Workaholic, why don't you stay for the party?"

"No, thanks. One thing I'm sure you'd be much better at are the "meet and greet" parts of my job; go and join the fun. Besides, I need to check on my dad, make sure he hasn't been overdoing it while I've not been around to watch him."

She let him go and stood, hands on hips, watching his departing back. She thought back to other times when they had returned from successful missions. They would hug and laugh, sometimes even kiss, but that seemed to have gone. She wondered how they had managed to frak up their relationship so badly. Actually, she knew why; it was pretty much her fault. But then Lee was such an anal, stiff-arsed, emotionally-stunted frakking idiot, she should have known how he would behave when it came to addressing the growing feelings between them; put up emotional shutters and back off. She knew this, but she couldn't understand it. He was so unlike Zac. With Zac what you saw was what you got. He had been so easy to understand and to love: she couldn't understand Lee at all, but she seemed compelled to try. She wanted to be the one to take away that seemingly permanent frown he was wearing at the moment, but she just had no idea how to go about it. She sighed and turned back to the party getting into full swing in the hanger bay. She would just have to leave him be for the time being, to work through whatever demons were driving him by himself. She trusted the Gods that he would get through it and would come back to her eventually; she just hoped that it wouldn't take too long.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

And so life went on. They had a star chart for a solar system that supposedly included earth, but no way of finding it other than by sheer luck. The Cylons had been beaten back, but no one believed that they would be gone forever, so the fleet continued to jump from system to system, seeking out whatever fresh supplies each system had to offer. After all the excitement of Kobol, they got back into the daily routine in CIC and the regular CAP. The commander continued to recover well and had virtually taken back full control of the ship. The only potential blip on the horizon was the up coming elections, but with the president's cancer now in full remission, thanks to the drug they had been able to make from the plants found on Kobol, she approached the upcoming fight against Tom Zarek with renewed vigour and seemed certain to win.

Amongst all of this Starbuck and Apollo continued to avoid talking to each other about anything other than work. They flew together, ate together, they even slept in the same bunk room, his bunk above hers, and yet their camaraderie was gone. There was no easy joking, no morning jog together and no whopping his sorry ass at pyramid of an evening. Kara caught him looking at her once or twice, but she interpreted his intense, brooding expression as "I don't know you anymore; you're a slut". He interpreted the fact that she still hadn't chewed him out over the fight in the hanger bay incident as a sign that she didn't care anymore. Neither one was happy, but neither seemed willing to be the first to make the steps towards reconciliation. If Lee occasionally thought over Baltar's words to him during the journey back from Kobol, he chose to interpret them as the doctor's way of keeping his ego inflated and covering up the fact that Kara had rejected him after that one night together, rather than based on any possible reality.

This sense of suspended animation in their relationship lasted for about 3 weeks.

After what seemed an impossibly long day sorting out all the petty gripes of his pilots and spending an uneventful 4 hours on CAP, Lee grabbed a late dinner and joined the table in the mess hall at which Kara sat with half a dozen of the other pilots. They were discussing the elections. Several of the people around the table couldn't seem to forgive Roslin for countermanding the commander and were contemplating voting for Zarek or violating their ballot papers in protest.

"How can you even think about voting for him? He's a terrorist!"

"Was a terrorist. Things are different now."

Kara was fed up with the endless election talk and decided it was time to put a stop to it. As far as she was concerned there wasn't any choice who to vote for. Despite what had happened between them personally, she still thought Roslin was the woman for the job.

"Come on guys, how can you forget what he allowed to happen to Cally? If any of you vote for him you should be thrown off this ship. Just don't vote at all if you can't bring yourself to vote for Roslin."

There were nods of recognition and agreement around the table. Lee noticed that she hadn't said anything about Zarek's men beating him up. It was at that point that the Starbuck trade mark grin peeked out.

"Although Adam Baker would get my vote any day!"

"Ohh, too right," agreed the other women around the table.

For his vice presidential running mate Zarek had chosen a popular ex-grassball player from Picon who was drop dead gorgeous and had the body of a god. As a political move it was brilliant: the man had virtually no brain cells which meant he would be easy for Zarek to manipulate, and just seeing his megawatt smile seemed to have droves of the women of the fleet queuing up to vote for him.

Lee had been following the conversation, but had not joined in. At Kara's mention of Baker's name, however, he had looked up at her. She was looking at him, grinning from ear to ear, seeming to challenge him. It was that cocksure grin that set him off. It fuelled the anger and frustration towards her that had built up in him and festered since he'd found out that she'd slept with Baltar.

"Yes, I'd bet you'd like nothing better than to add another vice president to the notches on your bedpost," he said with ice cold venom.

There was sudden silence around the table, some of them looking at Lee in astonishment, some at Kara. She was starring at him with a "not here" expression on her face.

"Captain Adama, sir. I believe we need to have a little discussion in the privacy of your office."

"Fine," he replied. He pulled back his chair and left the mess hall at a fast march. She threw her chair down and followed him, leaving a stunned silence in her wake.

"My money's on Starbuck," said Crashdown to break the spell and they were soon all into serious betting.

−

Kara followed Lee into his office and slammed the hatch shut behind her with a violence that shook its hinges.

"I can't believe you just said that in front of everybody!"

"What, they don't know that you scored with the vice president of the colonies?"

"No they don't. I like to keep my private life private. Thanks to you it will be all over the ship in a matter of hours."

He crossed his arms over his chest and stared at her in an "I don't give a frak" type of way.

"What is your problem Lee? Is it that I slept with Gaius or that I didn't sleep with you?"

"You're assuming a lot if you think that I want to sleep with you."

"You're a man, Lee. I've never known one turn down the offer of a good frak."

"Well that's your problem isn't it Kara. You keep offering. Well, sorry but I've got a bit more self-respect than that."

"Yeah, right. I doubt you could handle me anyway." She knew that she was playing with fire with Lee in this kind of mood, but she couldn't seem to stop herself. Even this reaction from him was better than nothing.

"Oh, so you think that I couldn't handle you. We'll see about that." Without warning he grabbed her arms in a tight grip. He pushed her hard back against the wall and brought his mouth down on to hers in a savage kiss.

"This is what you want, isn't it Kara?" he demanded against her mouth. She came to her senses as his intentions became all to clear.

"No, Lee, please…please, not like this."

"Not like what, Kara? I thought this was how you liked it. Rumour had it at the academy that Starbuck liked nothing better than a quick, hard frak. Well I'm going to give you the quickest, hardest frak you ever had." He almost snarled as he ripped open his own pants and started to pull down her sweats.

"Lee, please stop it, I don't want it to be like this."

She struggled to stop him but his rage seemed to have given him extra strength. She was almost crying as he ignored her pleas and pushed her back onto the desk, sending all his papers flying. Kara knew he was beyond control now. Something had snapped inside him: she had often wondered what would happen if he ever really lost control. Well now she was finding out with a vengeance. The thing really worrying her was that, despite her pleas for him to stop, she wanted this; really wanted it to happen. Seeing him raw and uncontrolled was surprisingly erotic and beautiful. As he thrust into her, she brought her arms around him and snaked her legs around his hips, drawing him in deeper. She knew this was wrong on so many levels, but she wanted him so badly she'd take it this way if it was all she could get of him. That probably made her the slut that he seemed to think that she was, but right now she didn't care. All she cared about was Lee's hard body grinding into hers and the sensual pleasure of his mouth. She reached her climax as he reached his, crying out his name, as she had done once before.

They lay in silence for a few moments, both breathing hard. Lee raised himself on one arm to look down at her.

"I bet it wasn't that good with him," he said in a hard voice, a self satisfied smirk on his face.

His words brought her back to reality with a jolt. What had she done? She'd just let the man that used to be her best friend frak her on his desk. They hadn't really even gotten around to taking any clothes off. Had she lost all self respect? Lee had done that to her: he had made her loose her respect for herself because he didn't respect her anymore. His respect was always been something she had valued and now it was gone. She felt used: they had used each other in a way that good friends shouldn't. She felt cheap and dirty and used.

"You bastard," she said as she pushed him off of her with all her strength, quickly pulled her sweats back on and ran out of the office before he could stop her.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

Kara brought the viper to a rather shuddering halt on the deck. It wasn't her greatest landing, but what could they expect when she was so tired she could hardly see straight and her hands wouldn't stop shaking. She didn't even have the energy to climb out of the cockpit, but sat there in a kind of daze, just staring at the busy deck in front of her. The Cylons had found them again about a month ago. The defeats they had inflicted on their enemy at the tyllium asteroid and Kobol seemed to have speared them into an even more aggressive attempt to finally wipe out what was left of the human race. It didn't seem to matter where they jumped to, anything from a raider recon patrol to a full base star seemed to turn up within a day or two, sometimes less than hours. The crew of Galactica were finding this unpredictability almost as hard to deal with as when they had been turning up every 33 minutes. At least then it was possible to plan and get some rest, even for a short period; now they had to spend the whole time on alert. The last few weeks had passed in a haze of stims and sleep deprivation. Each time she went out on CAP Kara didn't know whether it would just be routine or whether her luck would finally run out and she would be blown out of the sky, and it was playing havoc with her nerves. They were down to 25 ships now and still not enough pilots to fly them. The CAG had instigated larger and longer patrols to try and keep the fleet protected, but sometimes it felt like throwing water droplets at a huge oil fire, but they kept on because there was no one else and there seemed no other option if the human race was going to survive.

"Sir! Sir! Are you OK?" She finally registered that her helmet was off and the deck hands needed her to get out of the plane.

"Yeah, I'm fine." She wasn't really. She knew she had to report to sick bay and she wasn't entirely confident she could bluff her way through the exam. Since this latest attempt by the Cylons to eradicate what was left of the human race had begun, Lee had introduced a requirement for all pilots who did 10 or more shifts for 2 weeks running to be checked out by sick bay before they were allowed to fly again. Kara had managed to avoid it so far by doing 9 shifts in the second week, but this time she had been caught out by a pair of Cylon raiders, which meant that she had pulled a double shift and crossed over the magic 10. She thought about just ignoring the ruling, but then that would get her a visit from the CAG, something she was avoiding at all costs at the moment: even a trip to sickbay was better than facing Lee. They had hardly exchanged two words outside the pilot's briefing room since that night in his office. Lee seemed to be avoiding her just as much as she was avoiding him; from embarrassment or disgust she couldn't tell. He just seemed to look right through her whenever she saw him. Everyone knew that something was very wrong between them, but they had largely ignored it in the frantic activity of the last few weeks. Even their closest friends were choosing to ignore the fact that the CAG and his senior pilot couldn't actually stand to be in the same room together for more than a few minutes. The other reason why their friends may have been backing off is that neither of their tempers was exactly predictable at the moment. Kara would have had the obligatory trip to the brig the other evening if Helo hadn't managed to stop her from trying to take down about three of the deck crew in one go. Even the commander seemed to have picked up on it. Kara hadn't seen him very much since the Cylon attacks had begun again, but every time she did he seemed to give her a long searching look that she thought held a hint of sadness and exasperation.

If truth be known she desperately wanted to make it right with Lee, but she just didn't know how, and frankly, after the events of that night in his office, she thought he should really be the one to make the first move. Yet she missed him so much; missed their joking, the flying rivalry and just his presence along side her on her morning run. Deep down she also knew that they could really have something together if they could only stop frakking up their relationship at every turn. That one time together, however wrong and almost brutal it may have been, had shown her the type of feelings he could generate in her and that was something she wanted to experience again.

She heaved a sigh, sniffed back the tears that threatened to fall and started on the trek to sickbay.

−

"Ah, Lieutenant Thrace, I was wondering how long you'd be able to avoid the Captain's latest dictate." Major Cottle took a long, satisfying drag on his cigarette and stubbed it out in the ever present and overflowing ashtray in his treatment area. Where he kept getting them from the Lords only knew; the man obviously had a huge secret stash somewhere.

"Can we just get this over with? I'd really like to sleep before I have to get back in a plane!"

"Well that rather depends on what we find, doesn't it! Chart says you've clocked up 94 flying hours this week. That's way more than any one else, even those doing more than 10 shifts."

"Yeah, well they're not trying to teach idiots too young to wipe their own asses how to fly a viper without a simulator…sir," she added belatedly.

"OK, OK, calm down Starbuck!" He shined a light in her eyes, "blood shot as hell but otherwise OK," then moved on to test her reflexes and a couple of reaction time tests with which he seemed satisfied. "Give me you arm. I need to take some blood and I also want you to pee in this cup. After that why don't you try and get some shut eye on one of the spare beds while the tests are done."

"Sure, though how the Lords you expect me to even squeeze out a drop when I've been sweating in a viper for the last eight hours I haven't a clue."

"Drink this and think of Caprica," he said, handing her a bottle of water. She was the last person he should have made that lame joke to, but she chose to ignore it and took the bottle from him with a sigh of resignation.

Her sample provided, Kara lay down on one of the sick bay beds and dozed. She must have fallen asleep at some point because the next thing she knew Cottle was shaking her awake. Instead of just giving her the OK he led her into his private office. He didn't even have the perpetual cigarette hanging out of his mouth and looked very grim.

"Oh shit, this must be bad" she thought. She knew that she hadn't drunk or smoked anything that she shouldn't have; she seriously doubted whether there was any shit worth the name left on the Galactica and she would never take the risk when she was flying. She looked hesitantly at Cottle. He wasted no time in coming to the point.

"Lieutenant, did you know you were pregnant?"

"What? You've got to be frakking kidding me! This is a wind up, right? Its some kind of sick joke you've cooked up with Lee to get me out a plane for a while?" Oh Gods, Lee…

"No I'm afraid not, Kara," the doctor regarded her solemnly.

"Come on doc, there's been some mistake with the test," she said, the desperation showing in her voice.

"I'm sorry, Lieutenant but there is no mistake. You're definitely pregnant and frankly I would have expected you to have been more careful. If you needed contraception you should have come to me. You of all people shouldn't be getting pregnant after the radiation exposure you received on Caprica."

Oh Lords, she had frakked up royally this time.

"I can't be pregnant, doc, I just can't be. Oh what a frakking mess!" She put her head in her hands as she tried to take in what he was telling her. "What am I going to do?" She looked up at him, her eyes pooling with unshed tears.

"Nothing, at least for the time being. You're grounded. I want you to rest for at least the next few days and then I might OK you for shuttles and raptors, but no vipers until after the baby is born. The G-forces involved are just too dangerous in pregnancy."

After the baby was born! She was going to have a baby, Lee's baby. Her mind wasn't really working at all, but this fact seemed to leap out at her, along with the fact that the baby might be damaged by the radiation. She looked at Cottle helplessly.

"What if the baby isn't….isn't right, from the radiation, I mean. When will you be able to tell?"

"You're only about 6 weeks at the moment. Give it another couple of weeks and we'll be able to do some tests to see if there is any DNA damage." She nodded.

Major Cottle wasn't a very demonstrative man; you couldn't be in his job, but he genuinely liked Kara Thrace and he didn't like to see her so obviously devastated by the news he had just given her. He took her hand and went on quietly.

"You know that the president has ratified a law preventing any terminations unless considered medically necessary? Well I think that in these circumstances it would qualify as a medical necessity." Kara took a deep breath. He was offering her a way out. Half her mind screamed out to take it. It was the easy way out of her situation, but then she had never been one to take the easy way out. The last thing she wanted to do right now was have a baby, but in her heart she wasn't sure that she could just take up Cottle's offer without thinking it through thoroughly.

She also needed to talk to Lee desperately, but was unsure how he would react to the fact that their frantic sex in his office meant that he might become a father. That was going to be a great conversation: "Hey Lee, you know that quick, hard frak you gave me? Well guess what, we're going to get some long, slow payback for the rest of out lives!"

"Thanks for the offer, doc, but let's cross that bridge when we come to it. I need to think about it some more. If you tell me in a couple of weeks that the baby is …is too damaged to survive well then things might be very different. Right now I can't really take in all you're telling me." He nodded as she went on.

"I suppose you'll have to report this?"

"Yes, to the CAG immediately and the Commander by the end of the week."

That was all she needed. Right now all she wanted to do was crawl in her rack and wake up in the morning to find that this whole conversation with Cottle had just been a bad dream. Instead she was going to have to face Lee: the last thing she wanted was for him to read this piece of information in a report!

"Can you give me till the morning before the report goes to Captain Adama? I want to tell the CAG myself."

"Of course," replied major Cottle, who had a pretty good idea why, having observed them with each other in sickbay with rather alarming frequency over the last few months. He didn't voice his suspicion to Kara: she already looked enough like a train wreck without him adding to it by implying that he knew something was going on between her and her CO.

−

Lee was finishing up the days paperwork when there was a discrete knock at his office door. "Come in," he shouted and was surprised to see Kara coming through the hatch. She closed it carefully behind her and turned to face him. She was as white as a sheet and if he didn't know better he would say that she was trembling. He wasn't surprised; she was probably remembering what had happened the last time that she had been in this room. Lee himself couldn't think of it without being completely disgusted with himself for treating her so badly. He just had no idea how to make it better between them, especially when she seemed to do her best to avoid him, so in true Adama fashion he just ignored the emotional turmoil between them and carried on stoically with his job. Something must be very wrong to bring Kara here, or maybe, he thought hopefully, she just thought that it was time to clear the air between them. He dearly hoped that it was the latter and that she would give him the entrée he needed to beg her forgiveness.

She cleared her throat. "Can I speak to you on a private matter, sir?" Definitely something very wrong. She wouldn't look him in the eye, but was focusing on a spot on the wall behind his desk. His hopes of a rapprochement faded as quickly as they had come.

"Of course, Lieutenant," he followed her lead on maintaining formality "go ahead."

"Major Cottle has grounded me, sir."

Lee took a moment to assimilate this information. He may have found her a difficult member of his team but he could never fault her commitment to her job. The squadron would miss her, even for the shortest period.

"Really Lieutenant? I can't say that I'm surprised. You always did do more than your fair share of shifts and if you don't mind me saying so, you look like hell. How long does he think you'll be out of the cockpit?"

"Doc recons a couple of days before I can go back to shuttles or raptors." He frowned, obviously trying to understand why she couldn't go back to vipers.

"What about vipers?"

Kara finally shifted her gaze to Lee. What he saw there made his heart constrict. Her eyes were swimming with tears and there was a look of utter desolation in her eyes. She took a deep breath, gulped and then still holding his gaze said,

"I'm pregnant, Lee."

There was a silence in the tiny office as the Captain stared at his Lieutenant.

"Oh"

"Oh! Oh! Is that all you can say?" Kara's uncertainty had turned rapidly to anger. "I'm pregnant with your child, a child that shows we broke every fraternization rule in the book, a child that may be damaged from cylon radiation because its mother should never have even thought about having unprotected sex after going to Caprica, and all you can say is Oh!"

"Wait a minute, how was I supposed to know that its mine, if it is." The moment he said it he knew that the words had come out all wrong. Her hand came out of nowhere. Usually Kara punched but this time a resounding slap stung across Lee's cheek making his eyes smart and leaving a reddening mark. He knew he deserved it for such a crass remark.

"You bastard. I thought you couldn't make me feel any cheaper than you did that night, but I see I was wrong. For your information, Captain," she almost spat his title "I've only slept with two men on this ship. Baltar, as you know, once and once only several months ago and you in this very room 6 weeks ago. Doc says that I'm 6 weeks pregnant; you do the math. If that's not good enough for you, I'm sure a simple DNA test will settle the matter."

She swung at him again. He was more ready the second time and grabbed her hand before it could connect with his face. A sob escaped her and the fragile control she had been maintaining gave way. Lee didn't think twice and pulled her into his arms.

"I'm sorry Kara, I'm so sorry," he whispered as she sobbed into his shoulder, great body-wracking sobs that tore at his heart and finally opened the flood gates on his pent up emotions. "I didn't mean it; I never meant any of it. I know you don't sleep around any more, but I was so frakking jealous and hurt, thinking of you with that upstart little twerp, that I wouldn't listen to your apologies. I'm such an emotionally-stunted frakwit that I just ended up hurting us both more and not knowing how to make it right. Tell me there's still a chance I can make it right, please, please tell me Kara." She raised her head from his shoulder.

"Is it possible to make this right? Not us, I mean this whole situation. Both of our careers are screwed: I'm pregnant and grounded and you're going to get charged for getting a subordinate into that condition. It doesn't get much worse than this, Lee. Oh, unless we consider that I may have condemned our child to some horrible disease or disfigurement by going on that frak-forsaken mission to Caprica."

"Right now I don't care much about my career, what there's left of it. What I care about is whether there is a chance that you'll ever forgive me for what I've said and done to you over the past months. I've been mad Kara; I don't know why, may be its some inner demon that says your still Zac's girl and I should just get over my feelings for you. All I know is that I didn't want to need you the way that I do, so I've fought against it. I should have known better; we always did face every adversity so much better if we did it together. Before it was just a test at the academy or a particularly difficult mission, now it seems to be a whole god-damned life-changing event every day."

He had finally said that he needed her, had feelings for her. Kara didn't know whether it was a conscious confession or not. Even at this moment, when her whole world was in such turmoil it made her feel better. She looked at him for a long moment, holding the gaze of the bright blue eyes looking beseechingly at her. She found those eyes so impossible to resist.

"All those things you said, they really hurt me Lee," she said quietly. He nodded sadly, acknowledging the hurt he had caused her as she went on, "but they didn't really change how I feel about you."

"Which is how?" His hopes began to rise that they could overcome the frakked up mess they had made of their relationship.

"I'm really not too sure yet. All I do know is that I want to be with you. I miss you so much when we're not talking. You make me…better." He sighed in relief, but he had to get everything cleared up between them or they would never get through this together. He raised the subject that had been haunting his waking hours and disturbing his sleep since that fateful night.

"And what about the things I did to you Kara. Isn't that worse than just words? All I've been able to think about since that night is you pleading with me to stop. I was so damned angry and out of control it just made me more aggressive rather than the opposite. I've never been so ashamed of anything so much in my life. And now it's even worse! Can you ever forgive that? Can you forgive the fact that this baby was conceived in that way?

"There is nothing to forgive. I don't remember pleading; just wishing our first time could be a little more romantic than a frantic grope on your desk."

"You're more forgiving than I can be of myself. My gods, I practically raped you," she grabbed his jaw and made him look at her.

"No Lee, you're not to think in that way; it was never even remotely rape. Did you really think you could get the better of me that easily? You're not that strong, Adama! I could have stopped you if I'd really wanted to, but I wanted it just as much as you did." He smiled slightly in relief and grabbed her in a tight hug.

"Oh Gods, I know I don't deserve your forgiveness, but thanks, you can't know what it means to me to hear you say that. And by the way, I feel just the same; I've been so miserable without you." He stroked her cheek with a gentle finger.

"Me too. I thought I'd lost your respect as well as your friendship. I need to know that I still have it, Lee."

"You never lost either. You know I've never really been much good at dealing with emotions; they always seem to make me say and do the wrong things so I always figured I was just better ignoring them." He kissed her gently, trying to convey all he felt without the words that were so difficult for him. He sat down on the chair at his desk and pulled her onto his lap. They just sat there in silence, arms wrapped around each other, absorbing each others presence and letting the angst and hurts of the past months ebb away. Kara felt she could stay that way forever, but they had yet to resolve how to deal with the matter at hand.

"Lee, what are we going to do?"

"I don't know. We've really frakked up this time haven't we?"

"Yup, well and truly!" He raised his head and looked at her hesitantly.

"If you want, I could appeal to my dad that yours is a special case and get him to sanction a termination."

"Major Cottle already offered me that option; I just don't think I can do it unless the radiation damage is really bad. I wasn't raised that way and all that's happened over the last months has made me appreciate even more just how precious human life is; even one we didn't plan to exist."

"Yeah, I know what you mean." He took several deep breaths. This was just too much for him to take in right now, but he needed to make sure that Kara understood that he would be there for her.

"I want you to know, that I'll support you in whatever decision you make. If…if you want to keep the baby then I'll be there 100 of the way. If not, then I'll be there for you through that too."

She lent her forehead against his. "That's what best friends are for, right?"

"I think that I'm more than a friend in this, Kara. I've…. I've wanted to be more than a friend to you for quite a while now. I just wish it was in slightly different circumstances."

"Well, if it has taken this to get us to really face up to our feelings then at least something good has already come out of it. I wouldn't just take a decision and be done with it, Lee. It's your child too."

He looked at her "Well, if it makes it any easier, I'm completely with you. I wouldn't want to just get rid of it because it wasn't convenient, but things would be different if there was medical reason."

"That's good. I'm just concerned that the Commander might make me do it, given the situation we're in and the need for trained pilots. The last thing we need right now is for me to be out of a cockpit for 9 months."

"No, he would never do something like that. I'm not saying he's gone soft or anything, but I think that he had a bit of an epiphany when he got shot and realised that perhaps family and relationships were at least as, if not more, important than work! I think we can trust him to support us, although I'm not sure what he's going to do about the fraternisation. I know that they are thinking of changing the rules but I think he was hoping for a less, er, high profile test case that didn't involve his own son!"

"I don't blame him!"

"But let's face it, in comparison with our previous records of mutiny and going AWOL this is pretty mild, and here we are still flying. Well I am anyway!" she cuffed him on the shoulder.

"That was a low blow, Lee and not even remotely funny."

"Sorry," he grinned sheepishly as he hugged her in apology.

"You do realise that my Dad's such an old fashioned old sod that he will expect me to do the decent thing and marry you." She looked at him in surprise and trepidation.

"I'm not sure that I'm ready for that just yet, Lee. I need to know that we can be more than just friends, and that we can maintain a relationship for more than two minutes without trying to kill each other, before I could even think about such a commitment. Besides, we also need to know whether there's really going to be a baby; you know, whether it's healthy. I can't really focus on anything beyond that right now." He nodded, knowing that she was right and realising how careful he was going to have to be with her to ensure that they moved from just friends to a couple.

"Well, we'll just have to deal with that when it comes."

"When shall we tell him? The docs report will be with him the day after tomorrow."

"I think I should do this alone," she started to protest "no, Kara, we're….we're getting on so much better now, perhaps better than we ever did even before Zac died, so I think we can talk about it like two sensible adults. Anyway in the first instance this is a military discipline matter and I need to deal with it as such."

"OK, I bow to your command, oh leader!"

"Well that's a first!" He kissed her quickly and hugged her again. He was sure that the enormity of their situation would hit him soon, that there would soon be extreme tests of their fragile new relationship, but right now he felt almost light-hearted that they were together again.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8**

"Enter" the Commander responded to the knock at the door of his quarters. "Hello son, come on in and sit down, I'm just about finished with this damned paperwork," he greeted Lee with a slight smile. Lee came in and sat down on the couch, sitting stiffly upright whilst he waited for his father to finish his work. He hadn't been this uncomfortable in this room since the day he first returned to Galactica.

At last the Commander turned to his son. He could tell Lee was rather nervous about something which was unusual. He thought that their relationship had progressed to a point where Lee didn't need to be nervous about anything he had to talk to his father about.

"I need to talk to you about an important matter sir," were Lee's first words, confirming Adama's suspicions.

"Is this a father-son conversation or a commander-CAG one?" Lee laughed slightly at the question. He thanked the Lords that his father seemed to be in a good mood this evening.

"I'd really like it to be a father-son one, but I think it probably has to be of the Commander-CAG kind."

"Fire away then CAG," replied the commander, intrigued about what was coming.

"Sir, I have to confess to having contravened the fraternisation regs with one of my subordinates."

Whatever the commander had been expecting it hadn't been that. He couldn't help his first reaction to Lee's simple statement being a fatherly one: he was actually very pleased at this sign of normal male behaviour in his son; he was beginning to think that Lee was made of stone. However, he knew that he had to treat this like a CO and not a father.

"You should really be discussing this with the XO, not me. Given our personal relationship I shouldn't be involved in matters of military discipline where you are involved."

Lee winced; if they had to go and confess to the XO, Kara would kill him.

"I understand that sir, but I'd still rather discuss it with you in the first instance" The commander nodded his acceptance.

"All right. So are you going to tell me who it is?" Lee could feel his whole face turning redder.

"Kara, er, Lieutenant Thrace, sir." Now it became all too clear why Lee didn't want to go to Tigh! Adama felt some relief that they seemed to have finally sorted things out between them. He knew that if he could have chosen any woman in the fleet for his son to be with then it would have been Kara.

"I can't say I'm that surprised; I've seen the way you look at each other and the way you fly together. I am aware, Captain, that the fraternisation regs as they stand are completely inappropriate given the current pitiful state of the human race. I gave up worrying about trying to seriously enforce them sometime ago after the incident with Valerii and Chief Tyrol. Although I'm not very happy about it, and shouldn't be encouraging you, I suggest that you join half of the rest of the ship and just carry on ignoring them. Just keep it discrete." Lee squared his shoulders and looked his father straight in the eye.

"It's the discretion part that's going to be the problem, sir. You see, Kara's pregnant."

"Pregnant? Oh Gods damnit, Lee! Why in the Lords name couldn't the pair of you be more careful? It's not like you're a pair of youngsters who don't know any better."

"I know sir, its unforgivable and entirely my fault. I didn't give the Lieutenant any chance to, er, plan in advance and didn't take any precautions myself." Lee was at squirming point. It was bad enough discussing your sex life with your commanding officer, but when that CO also happened to be your father it was excruciating. He wasn't sure whether they had slipped into the father-son part of the conversation or were halfway between; he just hoped that it would be over soon.

"So she's grounded?"

"Yes, sir, but only from vipers. Major Cottle is going to let her keep flying other craft for the time being and she can still keep up with the theory classes for the trainees. I just need to find someone else to take the nuggets out on training flights. We managed without her in vipers when her knee was busted, this will just be a bit longer."

"Yes, but then we weren't under constant Cylon attack. I think you'll miss her substantially more this time. Allow me to tell you that your timing is truly crap, Captain." Lee just set his jaw and decided silence was the best option at this point.

His father let out an exasperated sigh.

"Gods you're a pain in the ass, Lee. Give me one good reason why I shouldn't kick your ass straight in the brig?" Lee started to speak but his father held up a hand to stop him. "No, don't bother. You know very well that we can't afford to loose you from active duty, especially when you've made sure that your only viable replacement isn't available! I was hoping just to be able to quietly introduce changes to the fraternisation regs over time. Now I'm going to do have to do it asap. I suppose I'll have to sort things out with the XO as well or we'll have Kara in the brig instead."

"Thank you sir," his son said, with heart-felt relief.

Adama changed tack slightly.

"We've not talked about other options with regards to this matter, Lee." Knowing he was referring to terminating the pregnancy Lee didn't beat around the bush.

"No sir, but we'd rather not consider that at the moment. Although there is a possibility that the doc might recommend it because of Kara's radiation exposure on Caprica. We'll know in a couple of weeks. That's one of the reasons why I just wanted to talk to you: the fewer people who know, the easier it will be to deal with if the baby…..if we have to take that option."

The commander nodded, his expression grim. He sat silently looking at his son for several minutes. Lee was used to this thought process in his father; being used to it didn't make it any easier to sit through. Eventually he said,

"So when are you getting married? If I'm going to have a grandchild it had better be a proper Adama!" Lee smiled properly for the first time since the beginning of the conversation, knowing he was talking to his father rather than his CO.

"Well she won't have me at the moment, dad, but I'm working on it."

"She won't have you? What's wrong with the woman?"

"Yeah, hard to fathom isn't it!" replied Lee with a wry grin,

"Especially when I have it on very good authority that practically every woman in the fleet would like to be in her position. Send her to me and I'll sort it out." Startled, Lee looked very worried for a moment.

"I'd rather sort it out myself, sir!"

"Relax Lee, I'm only teasing you, but I would like to talk with her."

"Seriously dad, please don't push on this. We can't really think about that right now until we know whether the baby is going to be healthy or not. Kara's a mess; I think she's torn between the part of her which thinks that if there is a real medical reason to terminate the pregnancy then that will be a way out of something that she doesn't really want to do right now. The other part of her feels guilty for even thinking in that way."

"She's a strong woman son, she'll get through it."

"But that's just the problem, dad; she isn't that strong. On the surface yes; bold, brash Starbuck, the shit-hot viper pilot who can beat anyone in a fight in the air or out of it, but you scratch just beneath the surface and she's a mass of vulnerability."

His father regarded him in silence for a few moments.

"You really love her don't you, Lee?" Lee raised his gaze to his father's.

"Yes I do," he said simply,

−

Kara sheepishly stuck her head around the door of the commander's office.

"Come in, Kara, I won't bite."

"No sir, Lee said you wouldn't."

She sat down in front of him and he took her hand. They sat in thoughtful silence for a moment of two.

"I'm not going to pretend that I'm not as mad as hell with the pair of you. The commander in me knows I should demote you both and incarcerate Lee in the brig as an example to the rest of the crew. But things are different now and I need the pair of you too badly in whatever military capacity you're capable of right now to take that kind of action." He paused and smiled slightly "the father in me is so damned pleased that you've finally sorted things out between you that he's winning the head versus heart war at the moment. Although it would have pleased me even more if you could have done it without putting you out of a viper cockpit for 9 months."

"You and me both, sir. I'm still trying to get used to the idea."

"Not that I don't like the idea of having a grandchild. It's pretty much all an old man has to look forward to at my age." She snorted in reply

"Yeah, right! Do you want me to go back to my quarters and get you my cane, sir?"

"No, I'm not really ready for that just yet! But if you and the baby can make Lee laugh a bit more it'll be worth it. I worry that he takes everything so damned seriously."

"Yeah he does, doesn't he? Although I don't think I'd choose this a way of getting him to lighten up: I'm not too sure whether me and motherhood are going to mix."

"I bet you'll take it in your stride." She returned the pressure of his hand on hers and then bravely went on with the question that she really needed to ask him.

"Are you really OK with this, Lee and I, I mean?" She cleared her throat and went on "a part of me will always love Zac, but I realised after the destruction of the colonies that continuing to mourn him would just be selfish and self-indulgent; I need to move forward. I just didn't think it would happen so soon or that it would be with Lee."

"Zac wouldn't have expected you to mourn him forever and neither do I. I also suspect that if he had to choose who you would be with then it would be his big brother, and I have to agree with him. I'm happy for you, for you both."

"Thanks, it's really important to me that you approve."

"I do, on the condition that you let my son make an honest woman of you. I hear he's quite a catch!" He winked at her and she laughed.

"Yeah, so he tells me."

"He didn't want me to talk to you about this, but I want to encourage you to think about it."

"I know you do," she said in a small voice.

"He's a good man, Kara. I know I'm probably a bit biased, but you know you're like a daughter to me already and I wouldn't entrust you to just anyone, son or no son, if I didn't think they would look after you in the way you need to be looked after." He held up his hand as she started to protest, "Yes I know that you can look after yourself, but take it from someone who knows, that gets very lonely after a while. Take this chance while you have it."

She nodded, the tears that had been threatening to fall finally spilling over.

"Oh Lords, I'm such a frakking watering pot at the moment," she snivelled. He just laughed at her.

"You'd better get used it; welcome to the wonderful world of hormone swings!"

−

After Kara had left, the commander sat back and sighed. He had gotten all that what he wanted, or just about all, but once again his children hadn't made it easy. He pulled out his battered copy of the military code, took up his pen and started to strike through various paragraphs before picking up the phone.

"Dee, please send the XO to my quarters."


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**

Lee Adama was having a very bad day and it was still early in the morning. He had somehow thought that life would be better once he and Kara had resolved their differences, but so far it hadn't turned out that way. They still weren't officially together: Kara wanted things kept quiet until everything was resolved with the baby and his father wanted to get the changes to the military code ratified before their relationship became public knowledge. This meant that they were still sleeping in the officers bunk room and were just grabbing quick moments together in his office when ever they could. He desperately wanted to take her away somewhere private and make love to her in the way he had dreamt about, slowly and thoroughly, to eradicate any lingering bad memories of their one time together so far, but this wasn't feasible, because of both the need for secrecy and discretion and the simple practicality that they were still working all hours in response to the Cylons. Kara flying raptor patrols, filling the hole left by Boomer, was making his job easier on that front, but filling the enormous gap that she left behind in the viper schedules mainly came down to him flying an almost criminal amount of hours. He had had to submit to his own dictate and go through a medical exam. According to the doc he had barely passed, such was his exhaustion. And so he carried on just barely existing: fly, sleep, eat, fly, paperwork and not necessarily always in that order, day after day. If people were beginning to wonder why Kara wasn't flying vipers, they didn't ask. Their "gastric flu" excuse seemed to be working for the time being, probably fuelled by the fact that Kara's morning sickness had kicked in with a vengeance, but soon people were going to start putting two and two together.

This day had started off so particularly badly as a result of an unhappy night of virtually no sleep, as all the worries of the day ahead spun around his brain. Then he had had to watch helplessly as Kara suffered through a particularly bad bout of morning sickness, only able to offer the slight comfort of rubbing her back in sympathy. To say that she was less than impressed by this aspect of her pregnancy was an understatement of huge proportions. As she leaned back against him this morning she had quite clearly said,

"If you ever touch me again Lee Adama, I'm gonna rip your frakking dick off."

He had laughed nervously; it was never a good idea to ignore Kara's threats, even when you were pretty that sure she was joking. At least she seemed willing to accept any comfort he could give at these times.

Later on he was going with her to get the results of the tests on the baby, about which he was getting increasingly nervous. They hadn't really spoken about it, but he knew that she was petrified. Some how in between he had to organise the days patrols and discuss the increasingly desperate spare parts problem with the chief. His father had also decided to have something of a council of war with his senior officers to discuss their next tactics to try and break the current cycle of Cylon attacks. He was pretty sure that he needed to go out on CAP as well. All of this was running through his head as he stood quietly at the back of the ready room checking his notes for the morning briefing. A group of the younger pilots was standing a little way from him and he couldn't help over hearing their conversation. He knew that he should ignore it, but he just found that he couldn't.

"Hey, I heard Starbuck's grounded 'cos she's knocked up."

"Blimey, whoever took her on must have balls of solid rock!"

"Yeah, I wonder who the 'lucky' guy is." They all dissolved in laughter.

"That would be me, Lieutenant," said a quiet voice behind them. Their laughter died as they turned to see the CAG standing right behind them. There was a mumbled "Oh, frak" followed by a louder "sorry, sir," said in unison.

"It's not me you should be apologising to, but Lieutenant Thrace. I suggest that in the future you refrain from gossiping like a group of old women and show your fellow pilot, and I should add superior, some respect. If you've got time to stand around and rumourmonger then I'm obviously not giving you enough work to do." He paused to allow the effect of his words to register.

"Dismissed!" They all saluted sharply and beat a hasty retreat.

Oh frak, thought Lee. Now he'd really done it. Kara was going to kill him for publicly acknowledging their relationship and her pregnancy. It would be all over the ship in a matter of hours. He might as well have announced it over the frakking intercom. He made his way to the podium at the front, knowing that every eye in the room was on him, and probably not for the right reason.

−

Kara nervously paced major Cottle's office. She couldn't sit still and was twisting the ring on her thumb around constantly in her nervousness. Lee, who had decided not to confess about his lapse in the ready room given her current state of mind, grabbed her hand to try and stop her fidgeting. She looked up at him, her eyes huge pools of anguish in her face. Wordlessly he pulled her into his arms and held her. As she clung to his comforting warmth, Kara tried to sort out the turmoil that was going through her head. She'd decided that may be it would be for the best if there was something wrong with the baby, or if she just lost it naturally, as had happened some weeks previously to the Sharon Cylon who had returned from Caprica with her. The doc could find no apparent reason for the miscarriage, but said that sometimes it just happened. The toaster had been so distraught she had found a way to take her own life. Kara had been trying to help Helo, who was flying with her as her ECO, come to terms with it. He seemed to alternate between despair, rage and relief; fortunately relief seemed to be winning now. These events had brought her own situation even more sharply into focus for her; she was experiencing the same changing emotions as Helo. Right now she didn't know how she would feel if the doc said that they needed to end the pregnancy.

A discrete cough behind them made them pull apart. Major Cottle pulled up a chair. If he was surprised by Lee's presence he made no comment on it.

"There's no need to look so tragic. There's nothing wrong with this baby's DNA at all," he told them bluntly.

Kara felt a huge sense of relief followed by a rush of anxiety: so that was it, no easy way out. Motherhood here we come!

"We can't rule out physical side effects just yet, but there's always that risk with any pregnancy." He looked at Kara seriously.

"I'm afraid I have no reason to recommend a termination as a medical necessity."

"I understand, sir and its OK I'd…." she glanced up at Lee, "we'd decided to go ahead anyway, if everything was OK."

"Well then, congratulations to the pair of you."

Lee spoke for the first time.

"Can you tell the baby's sex from the DNA analysis?" He asked.

"No, I don't want to know yet, Lee." Kara thought it would make it even more real for her if she couldn't just refer to the baby as 'it' and she felt that she needed more time to adjust.

"Why not Kara?"

"Well, it's a boy." The major cut off the argument.

"Sir! I didn't want to know."

"Sure you didn't, but I can't stand the pair of you arguing about it every time you come in here for the next seven months. Now, Lieutenant I want to see you in here for a full pre-natal exam in two weeks." With that he left them to it.

Kara looked at Lee. He had a silly lop-sided grin on his face.

"Oh Lords, you're going to be frakking unbearable aren't you? Not only do you get me pregnant the first time you frakking touch me, but with a son to boot!"

He sobered a little and reached up to cup her face with his hand.

"I'm sorry Kara, I can't help it. What…what do you want to do now? Do you want me to speak to dad more about…." She put a finger to his mouth to stop him.

"No Lee, it's OK. I guess….I guess we're just going to have to have a baby!"

−

When Lee entered the briefing room his father, Colonel Tigh and Lieutenant Gaeta were already there. His father looked at him, a question in his eyes; he knew they were seeing Cottle today. Lee gave him an almost imperceptible nod and a smile. The commander smiled slightly in return, relieved by Lee's unspoken message. Having got this cleared up he turned to the business at hand.

"All right gentlemen, it's time we did something other than run from these bastards."

They all knew that this was going to become a necessity soon. They were almost at the limits of their available star charts. Without this navigational knowledge they either had to double back on themselves or move forward under normal engine power until the Galactica's telescopes had surveyed each system and allowed them to calculate a safe jump. Either way it would put them at increased risk of Cylon attack unless they did something to break free. It was becoming increasingly obvious that the Cylons had some means of tracking them. The commander had ordered a complete survey of the fleet to examine anything giving out a radio signal or transmission of any kind. They had even shut down talk radio for the past week whilst the survey was carried out.

"Well Mr Gaeta?"

"We've completed the entire survey, sir. A number of devices have been found, but in general they're using recognisable colonial signals and frequencies. There is one, however, that doesn't meet any of our specs. We found it on the Horizon freighter. It gives a very low frequency signal that is not used by any colonial system I'm aware of, which is probably why we haven't picked it up before."

"And the people on this freighter?" Asked the commander

"It's a very small ship, sir. Just 25 crew and passengers. Their samples are being run through Dr Baltar's system as we speak, but there are no immediate indicators that any of them are Cylon agents."

The commander kept his views about Dr Baltar's Cylon detector to himself. He was still sceptical about the doctor's excuse as to why Boomer hadn't been identified as a Cylon by her first test. If, as he claimed, this was because the system was not fully validated at the time, then it meant that all the samples run so far could be wrong. He had ordered all the tests run before Boomer had been correctly identified as a Cylon to be re-run, especially Ellen Tigh's!

"Thank you lieutenant. Good work. Well gentlemen, it seems we have our bait!

"Bait?" Asked Lee

"Yes. If they're using this freighter to track us then we're going to use it to lure them in return."

"If they're tracking us, how come they're not turning up in the same clockwork way they were doing before?"

"Good question, Apollo."

"I suspect, Captain, that the beacon on the Horizon doesn't give out a very long range signal. It takes the Cylons varying amounts of time to pick up the signal after we've jumped," explained Gaeta.

"Mr Gaeta, I want you to plot two consecutive jumps. All the fleet will make the first and then all ships except the Horizon and the Galactica will make the second."

"What if we're wrong and it's not the Horizon but something else? The fleet would be unprotected."

"Good point, Colonel. Make that three jumps Lieutenant, the third only to be used if there's any sign of trouble. Captain, we'll need a raptor to accompany them to report back to Galactica."

"Yes sir!"

"So now the question is how are we going to deal with the Cylons if they accept our bait?"

"Well that rather depends on how hard they bite."

"Assuming that we get at least one base star?"

"We've still got the raider. What about we just use Starbuck's aborted plan from last time?"

"Good idea, Saul. Let's get her in here."

"What if they turn up with more than one base star?"

"Then we pray!"

−

Kara joined them quickly, glad to be involved in something to take her mind off her own current situation.

"Lieutenant, we're considering resurrecting your previous plan to use the raider to destroy a base star. Did you ever get around to testing its auto pilot?"

"No sir, but I'm pretty sure it'll be OK. Everything else we've installed has worked like clockwork."

"Yes, a pity, but I think we'll just have to go ahead and use it anyway."

"When do I leave sir?" She grinned at him. The grin was wiped away by Lee's next words.

"No Kara, you can't fly this mission."

"Well no one else can!"

"No I won't let you."

"I'm sorry to have to break up this little domestic argument, but Apollo is right Starbuck; you can't fly this mission. It's just too important: we can't risk you getting sick and not being able to complete it."

"Why on earth can't she do it? She never gets sick in the air. I've never known a pilot with a more cast iron stomach."

"Because she's pregnant." It was Lee's quiet voice that answered the colonel's question. Tigh's face was priceless. If Kara hadn't been so pissed off with the whole thing she would have enjoyed it immensely.

"Oh that's just typical, just when we really need her skills Starbuck goes and gets herself knocked up." He wasn't prepared for Lee squaring up to him.

"Take that back, you bastard!"

"Gentlemen!" The commander's sharp voice broke them apart. "Saul, I suggest you apologise for that remark."

"Sorry Lieutenant," he mumbled, looking from Lee to Kara, the penny dropping and the reason behind the commander's sudden rush to change the fraternisation regs becoming all too apparent.

"Well I'll be damned!"

"So, I think that we've established that Starbuck can't fly this mission. What you can do though, lieutenant, is train up a replacement pilot and monitor the raider from the CIC."

Kara was about to argue that she would rather monitor it from a raptor in the thick of the action, when she realised that the Adama men were ganging up on her in a mistaken attempt to try and keep her safe. She knew that she couldn't fight the both of them. If the pair of them were going to be this over-protective for the next seven months she wasn't going to be responsible for her actions when she killed them!

"I'll fly the raider dad."

"No, Lee. I need you in charge of the viper squadron." Kara smirked at him at this put down: it was a small victory, but anything was better than nothing right now.

"What about Helo?" she suggested. "He's seen it up pretty close and personal."

"Good suggestion, Lieutenant. How long do you think you'll need to train him?"

"I don't know. Three or four days? Depends on how quickly he learns."

"You've got 24 hours," the commander replied. She just grinned at him, pleased to have a challenge.

"I'm already on it sir!"


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10**

Kara took up her position in front of the console providing all the telemetry information on the raider. The sting had been set: the Horizon freighter was just floating in space, all the crew now safe on the Galactica. The battlestar itself was shielded from immediate attack behind a nearby moon. The rest of the fleet had jumped away. Now all they had to do was wait for the Cylons to show up.

Helo had adapted really well to the raider. He was now waiting in the forward hanger deck, one of their precious last remaining nuclear missiles loaded in the ship. She had felt rather sad when she had walked away from looking at the raider for the last time: in one way or another they had been through a lot together. She was very well aware that if it wasn't for that raider she wouldn't be alive.

The tension was rising amongst the crew as they continued to wait. The fear that they had been very wrong about the Horizon was starting to creep in when a bleeping sound from the dradis console broke the relative quiet in CIC.

"Contact."

"What is it, Dee?"

"Um….Cylon base star, sir. They're launching raiders."

"Set condition one throughout the ship. Launch vipers." Tigh's voice could be heard reverberating round the ship. The commander turned to Kara.

"Starbuck, you're on." She spoke into her head set.

"Time to go, Helo. Gods speed."

"Roger that, Starbuck." Her screen lit up as the raider shot out of the ship.

−

The battle between the Cylon raiders and the vipers was intense. They couldn't bring the Galactica into it because her firing solutions would block Helo's route to the base star. Apollo flew past the Horizon and noted that the raiders hadn't engaged it at all and were actively avoiding firing on it: their suspicions about the device on board must have been right. He was pleased with how his team were doing so far. There may have been more raiders, but human pilots in a fight for survival had a certain edge over the machines in their gritty determination to win.

"Keep it up people. Nuggets, remember not to leave your leader and don't get cocky if you do hit the enemy: they hit back"

He saw Starbuck's raider coming up into the main area of battle. Helo had learnt the basics of the raider but he wasn't the pilot that Starbuck was, nor had he had time to get a real feel for the bird. He was also in a full EVA suit which made movement inside the plane was virtually impossible. Consequently the raider's movements appeared stiff and uncoordinated and its manoeuvrability diminished. Nor was the curtain of raiders in front of them parting for one of its own. Apollo realised that Helo was going to need some help.

"Helo, were going to see if we can clear a path through for you."

"Roger that Apollo."

The vipers flew around the raider taking out the others in its path. He only hoped that the Cylons wouldn't pick up on this strange behaviour of one of their ships. Helo managed to dodge around the last couple of raiders and then there was nothing between him and the base star.

"Setting autopilot now. Missile countdown initiated."

Helo started to back out, ready to make his escape, but when he pressed the button the hatch wouldn't open. He tried a few more times, hitting it harder each time in increasing frustration and panic.

"Damn!"

Back in CIC Kara waited impatiently for him to get out, the countdown clock ticking away rapidly in the background.

"Come on Helo, come on. You're getting too close."

Giving up with the button, Helo kicked the panel as hard as he could with his heavy EVA boots. It finally came away and he fell out of the raider into space, activating his EVA pack. The only problem was that he was now much closer to the base star than expected. The raptor coming to pick him up was going to have to get past the raiders before they could reach him.

"Apollo, Helo needs the cavalry."

"Roger Starbuck. Wicks, Striker, cover the raptor. Stubbs, get him out of their fast before that bomb goes off."

Accompanied by its viper escort the raptor dashed through the battle to where Helo was suspended in space. Just as they were picking him up, a stray shot caught its side, making the ship spin away before Helo could climb in. Stubbs managed to get the raptor righted, thankful to see Helo still clinging to the side. They pulled him in and shot away to safety.

Kara was tracking the raider. Her main concern was that loosing the air lock had thrown it slightly off course. If it didn't readjust it might just impact on the surface of the base star and their precious missile could be wasted. As she watched a huge grin started to spread across her face as the ship was automatically adjusted for a direct course into the heart of the base star: the Cylon transponder must have allowed them to control the ship as well as track it.

"Package delivered, sir!" She shouted. There was a sharp moment of suspended tension around the CIC as the countdown clock ticked down. In the air, Apollo was pulling his planes as far away from the base star as possible to avoid any fall out from the explosion. The clock went to zero and seemingly nothing happened. Then there was a rumbling noise and suddenly the base star was alight with fires and collapsing in on itself. A huge roar went up around the CIC.

With the controlling base star gone the remaining raiders became so disoriented that Galactica's vipers could just pick them off easily.

"Help yourselves people," said Apollo joyfully, but as he spun away his vision was filled by the last thing he wanted to see right now. "Oh holy frak!" Another base star had just jumped in close to the moon behind which the Galactica lay.

Apollo had a sudden crazy idea. He decided to take a leaf out of Kara's book and not think about it too much, just act on it.

"Galactica, Apollo, do you see what I'm seeing?" It was his father who answered.

"Unfortunately, yes."

"I've got an idea. I'm coming back in to pick up a nuke. Make sure the deck is clear 'cos I'm coming in real hot!"

Oh Gods, thought Kara, Captain Dipstick was going all instinctual on them again. She wanted to be annoyed with him, but knew that if it was her out there she would be suggesting the same thing.

"Negative, Apollo. Get everyone back here now; we're jumping."

"We've got to take it out sir; it'll be on the Galactica before we can jump. Besides if we don't we'll never get away from them." Kara moved over to the commander's side.

"He's right, sir." He looked at her briefly then issued the order.

"Make ready a nuclear missile for launch from a viper. Bring the ship around to engage base star."

−

Apollo brought his viper to a skidding halt on the deck. Almost immediately the deck hands were manoeuvring the missile into position and then he was off again.

The base star was bearing down on the Galactica, disgorging more raiders into the sky as it came. The Galactica pulled away from the moon. The commander waited until the first raiders had reached the Horizon and then ordered it destroyed. The missile took out the freighter and the raiders around it. The Galactica's portside guns set up a perimeter, keeping the raiders at bay. The few remaining vipers engaged the enemy as best they could, but they couldn't protect their ship entirely.

"Galactica, you've got incoming!"

Fortunately they weren't nukes but the old ship was still rocked. The lights in CIC went out briefly and there was the sound of equipment crashing down and breaking glass. They had just recovered from the first hit when a second missile followed.

−

Apollo's viper shot from away the Galactica. He dodged her guns and headed for the base star.

"Wicks, Hotdog. Make sure you keep my tail clean. We going in and we're going in as hot as possible." He hit his thrusters and slammed his throttle hard to the floor as the two other vipers came up slightly behind him. They sped towards the base star, taking out raider after raider in front of them with a grim determination. Suddenly there was screaming over the radio. It was Wicks. Apollo glanced away as his viper exploded.

"I'm hit!"

"Get away Hotdog, you can't help me any more."

Apollo carried on his frantic dash towards the base star, a raider closing in on his tail. He headed straight for the central portion of the great ship, knowing that this was the weakest point. A direct hit on the column joining the two stars together was his best chance of destroying the ship with a single missile. He got missile lock and fired. The missile was a direct hit, setting off a huge explosion. Apollo kept his throttle to the floor to keep in front of the flaming debris heading towards him. The raider closing on his tail was caught and exploded.

"Waaaa hoo," he screamed as he shot away.

Again, the raiders lost their purpose with the base star gone, but Galactica had taken a heavy battering. The commander called back his pilots and they jumped away to safety as soon as everyone was back on board.

−

The jump safely initiated, the commander looked around at his CIC. What a mess! Saul was getting gingerly to his feet having been thrown to the ground when a missile hit; he had blood streaming from a cut on his head.

"You need to get that looked at colonel."

"Aye, sir. Doubt it's done much damage; always had a pretty hard head!"

The commander smiled at his old friend and they shook hands in victory. People were getting up, shaking themselves down and picking up fallen equipment. One side of the room had faired particularly badly, a large gantry having collapsed to the ground. They would need the heavy lifting gear to fix that, he thought, knowing that some of their functions would be down for some time. He looked for Kara, but she was no where to be seen: probably heading straight for the landing bay to meet the returning pilots, which was exactly where he wanted to go. Gods, but he was proud of his son!

"Sir, I think you should look at this." Someone pulled him over to the damaged area.

"There are at least two people trapped sir."

He looked down and saw a hand sticking out from beneath the mass of twisted metal. A hand with a distinctive silver ring on the thumb.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11**

Lee brought his ship to a much more precise landing on the deck than his last one. He jumped down from the plane and moved to where Stubbs and Racetrack were helping a rather dazed Helo from the raptor. He shook the lieutenant's hand.

"Well done, Helo. Excellent job! I doubt Starbuck could have done it better."

"Thank you sir," he said through a grimace of pain. Apollo turned to the approaching medical crew.

"Get this man to sickbay. I want him checked out immediately." He turned to the chief who was hovering.

"Well chief, how did we do? Did Galactica sustain much damage?"

"I'm pleased to say that for once we seem to have got most of our birds back mostly in one piece, but then Starbuck hasn't been flying!" Lee just grinned at him. "As far as I'm aware the old girl came through it not too bad either; more incidental damage than anything else."

"Sir, sir! They're asking for you up in CIC immediately," one of the deck crew shouted across at Lee. His father probably wanted a report of the mission. When he arrived he was surprised at the amount of confusion in the normally calm CIC. It had obviously sustained much of the incidental damage that Tyrol had been talking about and people were picking up pieces of equipment and sweeping up glass. A group of people, including his father, were standing over by an area that had obviously taken the biggest hit. As he moved towards them the paramedic was speaking to the commander.

"I'm afraid specialist Burrows is dead sir."

"And Lieutenant Thrace?"

"I can detect a weak pulse. We'll know more when we can get this off of her, sir." The commander turned and shouted "where is the damned lifting gear?" He rarely shouted and he had a look of deep concern on his face. Lee had a sense of terrible foreboding. He saw the wreckage of the gantry and ran towards it.

"Kara? Oh Gods!" His father grabbed him before he could get there.

"She's still alive, Lee. They're bringing the lifting gear." He pulled himself out of his father's grasp and knelt down to take the hand poking out of the wreckage. Looking around he saw a trail of blood seeping out from beneath the metal and pooling onto the floor. Lee looked at the paramedic helplessly.

"She's…she's pregnant. Do you think that..…" he couldn't go on.

"It's difficult to say," the paramedic replied quietly "it could easily be from an injury, or yes, she could be miscarrying. Whichever, we need to get her out of there as quickly as possible before she bleeds to death," he said with more brutal honesty that thought for Lee or the commander's feelings.

The next fifteen minutes dragged by as a kind of torture for Lee. He couldn't do anything except wait for the needed equipment and when it did arrive he had to stand by and watch as the crew painstakingly worked to get the gear in place without hurting Kara further. As the wreckage was pulled away the paramedic got to work. There seemed to be blood everywhere. Kara was laying on her side with her arm thrown over her face, obviously in an effort to protect herself from the falling debris. There were various cuts across her body, but much worse, a large metal spike was sticking out of the top of her thigh.

"We've got to remove that before we can move her." Lee couldn't help a gasp escaping as the paramedic pulled out the spike and more blood welled out of the gapping wound. He was almost thankful that Kara was unconscious as the pain would have been excruciating. As the medical crew lifted her on to the gurney to whisk her away to sickbay, reaction from the euphoria of their victory followed by his fear for Kara began to set in and he was grateful for his father's steadying arm as he staggered.

"Go with them, son. I've got to stay here and sort things out. Let me know as soon as you know anything."

He didn't wait for a second invitation, but by the time he reached sickbay they had already taken Kara into the OR. He could only sit down in a chair and wait, his head in his hands. He seemed to be doing this with alarming frequency at the moment. At last Cottle came out to him. He gave him a quick smile and patted him on the shoulder as he lit a cigarette.

"Don't take this the wrong way, son, but I'm getting rather fed up of seeing you here."

"No offence taken, doc, and the feeling's mutual believe me. Tell me, how is she?"

"Well that spike got a major vein, but fortunately we got the blood loss stopped in time. She should heal relatively quickly." Lee felt the knot of anxiety that had settled in his chest start to loosen, but there was still another important question to answer before it would be gone completely.

"And the baby?"

"The baby's fine. He certainly is a strong little thing: I think you two had better get used to the fact that he's determined to make it whatever the universe throws at him."

−

Kara awoke and realised that she was in the familiar surroundings of sickbay. I seem to spend half my life here she thought. She glanced down and realised that her hand was clutched in someone else's. Turning to her side she saw Lee, obviously asleep, seated by the side of her bed. She smiled; he was still in his flight suit and even in sleep he looked exhausted. As she pieced together the events of the last day in her mind, the smile faded. The last thing she remembered was a voice saying "brace for contact" and then everything went black. She started to do a mental assessment of her injuries. She wasn't in any pain, but judging by the drips attached to her arm the doc obviously had her back on his magic stuff. She had a quick look under the covers and just saw a mass of bandaging around her thigh. Her next thought was for the baby. Oh Gods, had she lost the baby? If she had it would just be the punishment she deserved for wishing she would miscarry. Her lip started to tremble. When did it become so important that she hadn't had a miscarriage? Only a couple of days ago she believed the best thing that could happen was that she lost the baby and now she was desperately wishing for just the opposite.

Her agitated movements must have wakened Lee.

"Hey, you're awake."

"I lost the baby didn't I?" She said immediately

"No, Kara, he's fine" Lee gave her a reassuring smile

"Oh, thank the Lords." The sobs she couldn't control came. He quickly got up onto the bed and put his arms around her awkwardly.

"Hey, it's OK, shhh, shhh." Gradually her sobs subsided.

"When I first found out I was pregnant I just wanted the baby gone; now all I want is for him to be OK. How frakked up is that?"

"The whole universe is frakked up Kara; you're allowed this little change of heart." He settled himself on the bed next to her, his arm still around her shoulders.

"You've busted up your other leg this time, but not so badly. Doc says you should be healed enough to walk on it within the week."

"You know that hard ass CAG is going to fire me soon. I spend more time lying around in sickbay than I do in a plane."

"Well if the bastard gives you any trouble let me know and I'll sort him out!" They lay in companionable silence for a few minutes before something struck Kara about the recent events.

"You know Lee, this is all you and your father's fault. If you'd let me go in the raptor like I wanted to I'd be fine now."

"Yes, but then you might also be dead." He looked down at her, his expression serious. "And I don't ever want that to happen." He bent his head and kissed her softly. His expression still serious he said,

"Marry me, Kara."

"Is that an order, sir?"

"No, just a simple request from someone who loves you." She looked up at him, eyes huge and tears standing out on her lashes.

"Then I guess I'll just have to say yes."


	12. Chapter 12

**This chapter comes with a health warning for those of you who prefer a low sugar diet: Scores very highly on the slush-o-meter with sex thrown in for good measure (I'll let you decide whether it's gratuitous or not)!**

**Chapter 12**

The commander found that he was surprisingly nervous as he travelled with his son over to Colonial One.

"Have you got a ring?" he asked Lee, realising that it was a little late to remedy if he hadn't.

"Yeah." Lee brought out the thin gold band that until that morning had been hanging on the chain with his dog tags. He didn't know whether his father would recognise it.

"It was mom's."

"I know that son. I was the one who bought it for her."

"She gave it to me when she and Roger got engaged. Said she wanted me to give it to my wife so that every time I saw it on her finger I would be reminded of what it was like to be a military wife."

He glanced towards his father's ring finger.

"You still wear yours dad, even after all these years."

"Just because your mother and I couldn't keep living with each other, doesn't mean that I ever stopped loving her, Lee."

Lee nodded, realising that he had never really appreciated the depths of his father's emotions for his family, hidden as they were behind the mask of military discipline and duty. The occasional glimpses he had of them made him feel humbled and somewhat guilty that he had misjudged his father so badly.

"Are you nervous, son?"

"No, I'm not nervous dad." His father raised a sceptical eyebrow and a wry smile crossed Lee's face "I'm frakking petrified!"

−

Lee and Kara had decided to get married as soon as possible: neither of them were people who delayed doing anything once they had made up their mind to do it. They wanted to keep the wedding low key and so had chosen to hold it with just a few witnesses on Colonial One, rather than on the Galactica, where it would have been virtually impossible to have it without most of the crew turning up. When Lee and his father reached Colonial One, the president, Elosha and Billy were already gathered in the president's office. Elosha was humming quietly as she busied herself with the arrangement of her scrolls.

"So nice not to be using the funeral ceremony for once. I can't remember the last time I officiated at a wedding."

Dee slipped in and gave everyone the thumbs up then went to stand by Billy. Kara had asked her to come with her, ostensibly to help her get ready, but the real reason was because she hoped that seeing another couple get married would chivvy Billy into finally asking Dee to do the same.

Kara came in, her dress uniform immaculate and her hair prettily arranged; there were even some signs of make up. She looked very nervous, her eyes huge in her face, but her smile broke out when she found Lee's gaze. He came towards her, hand outstretched. She took it in hers and they turned to stand in front of the priest.

"We are gathered together to celebrate the ancient rite of marriage between a man and a woman," Elosha began and then continued with the familiar words of the marriage ceremony handed down in the scriptures by the Lords of Kobol. Lee said his vows and slipped his mother's ring onto Kara's finger. She took the silver ring from her thumb and put it onto his ring finger.

"May the Lords bless this marriage for as long as you both shall live."

"So say we all."

Lee leaned forward and kissed her as everyone clapped. The president cleared her throat to make a little speech.

"In deference to Lieutenant…" She paused "should I say Thrace or Adama?"

"Thrace," replied Lee. "We decided there were quite enough Adama's on Galactica already. Although she'll be Mrs Adama when we're off duty!" Kara gave him a quick dig in the ribs to get him to stop embarrassing her.

"Well then, in deference to Lieutenant Thrace's condition, we'll toast you with sparkling water! Very best wishes for a successful marriage and may this baby be the first of many; the human race needs them."

Kara wished a big hole would open up in the floor and swallow her. Thank the Gods they hadn't invited more people to be here. When the president had found out that she and Lee were having a baby she had wanted to use them as some sort of promotional couple to support human procreation in the fleet, supposedly in a "if our viper pilots can do it, so can you" type of way. Kara had been horrified. It had taken the commander's intervention to dampen Laura's enthusiasm for the idea. Kara wasn't sure what he had said to her to make her stop, but frankly she didn't care!

The commander came over to her, hugged her tightly and kissed her cheek.

"Well, so you get to be my daughter properly at last. I'm very glad Kara."

"Thank you, sir"

"Do you think we might be able to drop the sir when we're off duty in favour of dad?"

"I'll try, sir…I mean, dad."

The president came up to join them.

"I have a wedding present for you." She handed them an envelope "Two nights accommodation on the Cloud Nine." The commander joined in.

"And I've arranged for the pair of you to have the next three days off so enjoy your honeymoon. I'll give you the rest of your wedding present when you get back to Galactica"

"We didn't need presents, dad, Madame President, but thank you," said Lee, ever the diplomat.

−

They had scrounged what civilian clothing they could so that they didn't stand out too much in their military uniforms on the Cloud Nine. Lee handed over the tickets the president had given them to the receptionist. Kara tried not to giggle at the names in the register: Mr A P Lo and Mrs S B Lo.

"Welcome to Cloud Nine Mr and Mrs Lo. You'll be staying in our honeymoon suite." The honeymoon suite turned out to be a sumptuous apartment on the top floor of the hotel, overlooking the gardens and the ornamental lake. The main room contained the biggest bed Kara had ever seen.

"Frak me! Half of Galactica's crew could sleep together in this."

"Well I hope they're damn well not going to join us!"

They continued to explore. The piece de resistance was an enormous sunken Jacuzzi in the marble bathroom.

"Do you think this works?"

"I don't see why not. This is a long term cruise ship. It probably has a very efficient water recycling system." Lee reached down and turned on the taps. Sure enough, steamy water streamed out.

"Lords, I can't remember the last time I had a really long, hot bath."

Lee just laughed. Back at the academy Kara had been famous for blocking up the bathroom for hours on end while she soaked in the bath. He could still picture her, head poking out of the mounds of bubbles with a stogie sticking out of the side of her mouth, glass in one hand and some trashy novel in the other.

"I'll run you one. You deserve it. It's been a long day."

−

Lee sat on the side of the bath just watching her as she lay back in the bubbling water, a beatific smile on her face. For some reason he felt incredibly nervous. He was suddenly overwhelmed by the fact that it all seemed to be happening so fast. A couple of months ago they were barely talking and now here they were married and with a baby on the way. He didn't kid himself that this wasn't what he wanted: he had finally admitted to himself that he had been in love with Kara for a long time, but he didn't feel in control of the situation and that was always difficult for him. He tried to analyse his nervousness. It wasn't about living with Kara; they had essentially "lived together" in the academy and even now they bunked in the same cramped room. There wasn't much that he didn't know about her habits and eccentricities and vice versa. The only thing they hadn't done then was sleep together in the full scripture sense of the word. Now he was finally getting to the bottom of the problem: sex. He was nervous about coming up to her expectations in that department. They had been building up to this for so long that he didn't want it to be a let down, which was primarily why he hadn't taken her off to some secluded corner of Galactica after she had come out of sickbay. In his mind, tonight would be the first time that they had made love: whatever the consequences of their previous experience may have been, he didn't really count it.

He was also not entirely sure of Kara's feelings for him. She had never said that she loved him. He hoped that she hadn't married him for just the baby's sake and to get away from the pressure his father had no doubt subtly exerted on her. In his experience there wasn't anyone who could pressure Kara into doing anything that she didn't want to, with the exception of his father. They hadn't really dealt with half the issues between them; they had just leapt straight into marriage. But then, Lee reasoned, they had had plenty of demonstration recently that there was no point in waiting for everything to be just right anymore: it could all so easily be gone in the blink of an eye. It was better just to do what felt right at that moment, and in his mind this just felt right. Gods willing, they would have plenty of time in the future to work through all of the things they needed to to make their relationship work.

All of this was going around Lee's head as he watched Kara enjoy her bath. She interrupted his thoughts in a way that only Kara could.

"Well then Apollo, get yourself in here and treat me like a husband should."

"What, in a Jacuzzi? Could be interesting." He hesitated.

"What's the matter?" She asked.

"Well you did threaten to remove certain parts of my anatomy that I'm rather fond of if I touched you again."

"I think you're safe for the moment; you can't get me doubly pregnant!" Lee still had a hesitant look on his face. He wanted this to be so right and he wasn't sure that he could pull it off in a Jacuzzi!

"You don't fancy it in the bath? Well maybe later."

"Yeah, think how bad it would look if one of us drow…….ned." His words caught in his throat as she stood up, the water running in rivulets down her naked body.

Get a grip Lee, he thought, you've seen her naked hundreds of times. But this was different: she was quite clearly offering herself to him, but then again why shouldn't she, he reasoned, it was their wedding night after all.

Lee decided that it was time to stop thinking and start acting. He stood up and fetched one of the large fluffy towels from the rail and held it open for her. She stepped out of the bath and into his waiting arms. He wrapped the towel around her, pulling her in close. Then he started to dry her with long, slow, rhythmical strokes of the towel. Kara's eyes closed and she had to bite her bottom lip to stop herself crying out ecstatically. By the time he had finished she was pink all over, and not just from the heat of the bath. Lee looked deep into her eyes, his expression unreadable. Then, without warning, he scoped her up into his arms and carried her through to the bedroom. He laid her on the bed and only stopped to quickly take off his own clothes before he joined her. Kara was secretly fascinated to watch him take control and let him carry on. He started by kissing the scar on her injured knee, and then moved to place a feather-light kiss on the most recent scar on her thigh, all the time caressing her lightly; his calloused hands on her soft, warm skin causing rivers of excitement to flow through her body. Then he moved up and almost reverently caressed the slightly rounded mound of her stomach before kissing it softly. He trailed kisses up her body, taking in the scar at the bottom of her ribs that he remembered from a training accident while they were at the academy and the one on her shoulder which she had gotten when their vipers had slammed into the deck after escaping the Cylons at Ragnar. He then turned his attentions to her breasts. With her pregnancy they were so ultra-sensitive that his slightest touch sent the most amazing sensations of ecstasy and pain coursing through her. By this time she had gotten to the point where she had to do something to stop him or she would explode!

"Lee, please….I can't take much more."

"That's a shame. I was just getting started."

She decided that it was time to re-exert some control of her own and pulled his head up so that she could explore his mouth in a long, deep kiss. She slid her hands down his body, enjoying the play of muscles beneath her fingers. He pulled away from the kiss and bent his head towards her breast again, only to stop short as her fingers closed around his erection.

"Two can play at that game, flyboy."

She got what she wanted as he returned to concentrate on her mouth. His own hand slid lower and as it slipped between her thighs he knew that she was more than ready for him. He let his fingers play for a while.

"Ready, Kara?" he asked, amazed at his own control.

"Just get the frak on with it, Lee." she panted, obviously close to the edge.

"Your wish is my command Mrs Adama," he said as he carefully slid into her.

That was when much of his control ended; the feel of her gripping him filled him with almost overwhelming sensation. As he started to move, she moved with him, adjusting immediately to his rhythm. Kissing and caressing, she seemed to grip even tighter and it drove him on towards the zenith.

"Oh, Gods…Kara….so good…."

For the first time he lost control completely as he hastened their pace further. He felt her convulse in orgasm beneath him and it sparked his own release.

Still breathing heavily he rolled onto his side, pulling her with him, so that he wouldn't rest too heavily on her stomach or healing wound. They lay there, still joined, breathing returning to normal, trying to take in the glory of what had just happened. Eventually he looked down at her and moved her hair out of her eyes with a gentle hand.

"Better?" He asked.

"Much better, and a damn sight more comfortable than your desk," she replied and reached up to kiss him. She felt him stir within her again in response to the kiss.

"Wow, now that is impressive, Captain."

"Well, we aim to please Lieutenant."

Later, when they lay sated in each others arms, Kara thought drowsily that sex with Lee was better than she'd ever imagined, even in her ambrosia-induced fantasy of him when she had been with Baltar. She found that she didn't want to move; ever. If only their lives could be suspended and they could stay like this forever, wrapped around each other in this enormous, soft, comfortable bed. She also knew that there was something she really needed to tell him, but she was just too damned tired and he was already fast asleep. "I love you" she murmured as she joined him in sleep.

−

They had both woken early out of sheer habit. Lee had pulled open the balcony doors so that they could lie in bed and see the sun rise, albeit an artificial one. They lay on their sides facing each other, each just drinking in the sight of the other and enjoying the fact that for what seemed like forever they didn't actually have to get up at all. A little smile was playing around Kara's mouth.

"I really must thank Gaius when we get back."

"What ever do you want to thank that frakked up nut job for?"

"Well, you know if I hadn't ended up sleeping with him after the colonial day party, and he hadn't been so indiscrete and stupid about it so that you found out, I doubt that we would have been here today."

"I don't know about that Kara, may be not today but.."

"No, it's true Lee. Whatever we may have felt for each other we'd probably just have gone on with the charade of being just friends because it was so much less complicated than addressing the other option. May be we might have gotten here eventually, but we would have wasted so much time when we could have been together. Me, because I think I'm a screw up who ends up hurting everyone she touches, and you because you won't deal with an emotion even if it comes up and hits you in the face," she said with the brutal honesty he had come to expect from her. He sighed, knowing that she had a point.

"You're probably right, Kara and if we're going to make this marriage work than I need you to help me. Tell me when I shut you out or hurt you in some way, don't just ignore it and let it fester. I know we need to talk about the way we feel more if we're going to stay happy, but you know I won't do it unless you push me to." She nodded as he went on "and in return I'm going to do everything in my power to show you that you're not the curse that your mother made you think you were, and to finally banish the demons that Zac's death left behind." He reached over to pull her to him for a kiss. She snuggled against him and tried to lighten the mood a little.

"I can't believe you called the vice president of the colonies a frakked up nut job!"

"Well he is and if he ever even looks at you in that way again I'll call him worse to his face. Punching him would just be too easy; he's a complete wimp!"

"Ooo, my hero and protector!" She looked away and composed herself for a moment. She thought that they had dealt with enough issues for one morning but knew that she had to clear this up once and for all, so when she looked up at him her eyes were serious.

"You know I was only with him because I was drunk and you didn't seem interested. I wanted it to be you so badly." She took a deep breath. "So badly in fact that all I could think about while I was with him was you and I, er.. um, called out your name when we were… were, you know," she finished, blushing.

"Oh Lords, no wonder he seemed so pissed with me," he said in awe, finally understanding the strange conversation with Baltar on the way back from Kobol. He caressed her cheek.

"I'm so glad you told me, Kara. If I'd only given you time to explain before you left for Caprica, then may be none of this would have happened." She looked frankly at the way they were lying naked together.

"Well that would have been a shame! But really Lee, you can't blame yourself for everything. I was the one who screwed up in the first place and didn't try to explain my behaviour."

"OK, so we're equally culpable. That night at the party I was more than interested but you were so beautiful in that dress and you seemed to be having so much fun with other people, and it was all so against the rules that I reasoned myself out of it. You know that over-thinking is my besetting sin."

"It was for you Lee. It was all for you," she said simply.

"I know that now. Try not to be so subtle with me in the future. When it comes to relationships I need clear, unmistakeable directions."

"OK then, how about this. Sir, if you don't shut up and frak me stupid right now, I may explode…sir!" He rapidly closed the space between them.

"Message received loud and clear Lieutenant!"

−

They spent almost every moment of the rest of their time on Cloud Nine together. They walked in the artificial sunshine, they talked about all the things they never seemed to have the time or the privacy for on Galactica, even deciding a name for the baby, and they made love. Sex in the Jacuzzi turned out to be spectacular and, despite Lee's fear, neither of them drowned. Somehow, even in this brief period of respite, some of the horrors of the last months were pushed away. They knew that they were in a sense of suspended bliss that wouldn't last once they got back to the Galactica, but they were determined to get their fill of it while it lasted.

"Can we take this bed with us back to the Galactica?" Kara asked as she lay, head on Lee's chest, on their last day.

"I think the hotel guys might just notice if we tried to sneak it out. Besides, it won't fit in my office. About the only room big enough in the whole ship is the briefing room and I don't think that my dad would be too impressed if we set up home there."

"OK so may be we could just pilfer a couple of pillows. I'm sure they'll fit in our bags along with the bathrobes I've nicked."

"Kara!"

"Oh lighten up Apollo. Everyone always nicks the bathrobes from hotels; they expect it. Anyway if they've got a problem with it they could just send the bill to Mr A P Lo!" He tried to look disapprovingly at her but failed.

"Come on Kara, all good things must come to an end. We've got to move; the shuttle goes in an hour." She looked up at him.

"Before we go back to reality, I want you to know that this has been just about the best time I've ever had."

"Me too." She hesitated for a moment before saying the words he had been longing to hear.

"I…..I love you Lee."

They didn't make the shuttle.

−

When they eventually got back to Galactica it was clear that the secret was out. Practically every pilot who wasn't actually out on patrol seemed to be in the hanger bay, plus a whole load of other people who had the flimsiest of excuses to be there. As they stepped out of the shuttle a round of applause broke out. The chief was first to reach them.

"Welcome back, Captain, Lieutenant and congratulations from all of your deck crew."

"Thanks Chief," replied Lee shaking the chief's hand.

"I'm supposed to tell you that your father wants to see you in his quarters as soon as your back," he said as he turned to hug Kara.

They were suddenly engulfed by all their friends and colleagues in a sea of congratulations. It took an age for them to get off the deck and make their way to the commander's quarters. He greeted them with a smile and invited them in to dinner. As they ate he observed them closely and was content with what he saw. The time away had done them both good. That tight look of constant worry seemed to have eased from his son's face and Kara looked more contented than she had in a long time. They were relaxed with each other; it wasn't any display of false camaraderie put on for his benefit, and when they touched each other it was in a way that screamed intimacy. They also couldn't seem to take their eyes off each other. It made the commander feel old, but in a good way as he remembered when he and Lee's mother had been the same way.

"I promised I'd give you the rest of your wedding present when you got back." Lee started to protest about not needing presents but his father stopped him.

"Hey, indulge the old man. If I want to give my son and daughter-in-law a present why shouldn't I?"

He led them out of his quarters and down a couple of corridors. He opened a hatch and stepped back to let them through first. Beyond was a large room simply furnished with a bed, a couch and a desk

"I didn't think we'd be needing any of the museum refreshment cafes anytime soon so I had this one converted. There was a restroom attached which has been converted into a head and there's a couple of storage rooms attached which can be made into a room for the baby. It's probably nothing like the luxury you've just had, but it's a hell of a lot better for a couple than the officer's bunk room."

"I don't know what to say dad!"

"Thanks usually works, son." Kara didn't bother with words, just gave him a big hug.

"Now I hate to bring you both back to reality, but there's a full officer's briefing at 0800 tomorrow. We need to discuss what we're going to do now that we seem to have got rid of the Cylons for a while." He left them to enjoy their new quarters.

"No rest for the wicked," sighed Kara

"No and let's face it Mrs Adama, you can certainly be very wicked," Lee said with a smile as he bent his head to kiss her.

−

**Author's note:** Hope this chapter hasn't been too much over-indulgent mush for you. Many thanks for all the feedback; glad you all seem to be enjoying the story. We're now nearly at the end. There's one chapter to go, possibly two if I decide to split it. I have two possible endings, one happy and one very sad. Now I'm generally a glass half full type of person who likes a happy ending, but I will consider doing the sad one if there is enough call for it.


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13**

Kara let out a huge sigh as she sat back from her work, rubbing at the spot where her son had just placed a well aimed kick. The baby was due in just over a week and she felt huge, no, scratch that, she was huge! Her ankles were swollen, her back ached and she couldn't remember the last time she'd gotten a decent nights sleep. She seemed to have permanent indigestion and all other manner of revolting digestive complaints and things had gotten to the embarrassing point of having to get Lee to help her put her pants on in the morning. She hadn't seen the inside of any ship other than the Galactica for three months and there had been no stogies or ambrosia for months before that. Yet she was happy: Happier than she'd ever been, in fact. It just didn't make any sense, but she wasn't going to argue with it. She had never expected to feel this way, but if the Lords had decided that she deserved this at the moment she wasn't about to question their judgement. She knew that it could all so easily be taken away.

It hadn't all been plain sailing. She and Lee had argued like all couples do, but underneath it all they had come to love each other very deeply. They had also been friends before they were ever lovers so they always had that friendship base to their relationship to fall back on when things got tough. She knew that she hadn't been the easiest person to live with over the last few months as all her favourite hobbies and pastimes started to become impossible. Lee had taken it all with a stoicism that made her want to hit him. In fact he had let her hit him on several occasions, but because he didn't seem to mind she hadn't gotten half the pleasure from it that she had hoped for!

She went back to analysing the piles of readouts in front of her. When she had finally had to stop flying altogether Lee had had the inspired idea of having her give lectures in advanced combat tactics to all of the pilots, rather than just the nuggets. Things had been pretty quiet since Battle Horizon (as it had become known) and so it was possible to take out time for continued training of the pilots. Kara had been using the huge amounts of flight information that was stored in Galactica's computers to provide her teaching materials. She endlessly analysed each pilot's data to find the best and worst examples to use as teaching aids. She wasn't usually one for the theories of flying; when you flew by natural instinct theory didn't mean much, but this was about as close as she could get to being in a viper right now. When she had first started giving the talks there had been the usual grumbles about back seat drivers, but she always delivered her advice in such a fun way that no one could be offended. So the pilots actually listened to what Kara had to say and they realised how useful it was. The CAG thought all their techniques were improving as a result.

She was just finishing up the preparation for today's session when Lee came in to their quarters. He wrapped his arms around her shoulders and kissed the top of her head.

"How'ya doin'?" He had been treating her like she might give birth on him any minute ever since her last appointment with the doc a week ago when he had said that the baby had turned round into the right position for the birth: it was driving her insane.

"I'm fine Lee, just finishing up the prep for today's lesson."

"You know you don't have to keep doing this now."

"And what am I going to do if I don't? I can't just sit around here like some enormous beached whale waiting for everything to happen. I'd go nuts."

"I know, I know. I just wish you'd put your feet up a bit more that's all. And you look nothing like a beached whale, you look beautiful." She gave him a 'who are you trying to kid' look.

"Face it Lee, I can't do it, it's just not in my nature, and if you don't get off my case I'm going to frakking deck you so drop it already! What are you doing back here anyway?" Lee knew when it was time to drop a subject with his wife if one didn't want to have to walk into CIC with a black eye!

"A Raptor patrol that just came in reported seeing something unusual on one of the planets in this system. I have to go discuss it with dad and Tigh in CIC so I need to get out of this flight suit."

For the last six months the fleet had been travelling under normal power in systems beyond the scope of their maps. Everyone was getting restless about finding an appropriate planet to stop at but no one, especially the commander, was convinced that the Cylons were gone forever. Until they could find a planet able to sustain human life that also offered some sort of natural defence from attack they forged onwards. There had been some unrest amongst the civilians, especially those on the smaller ships who were going stir crazy after so long in space, but the president had been able to deal with much of it without the need for military intervention.

Lee came back changed into his duty uniform. Kara reached up and caressed his major's insignia. They had finally made him a major, the usual rank for the CAG of a battlestar, a couple of months ago. She was incredibly proud of him, especially the fact that he was the youngest major in almost forty years, but then, she reflected, war had a habit of identifying the leaders amongst men, irrespective of their age. He had certainly risen to all the challenges that had been thrown at him almost constantly since the day he had stepped onto the Galactica. She thought that he was now hardly recognisable as that aloof and angry young man. She still ribbed him about being a big dipstick but she knew that she couldn't have done his job and stayed sane. There were just waiting for his dad to be made admiral now. That, however, was a political appointment which was probably why it seemed to be taking so long when everyone knew that he deserved it.

He bent down to kiss her before he left for CIC. He was about to say something but she stopped him.

"No don't say it! I promise I won't over-exert myself; it's physically impossible anyway. Now go off and be CAG!"

−

Lee entered the ready room and stood watching Kara teach for a few moments.

"Now see this turn, Kat?" she was saying, pointing to the reconstruction of the viper move on the screen. "You put yourself right in the enemy's line of fire. You were lucky to get away with it." She pulled up another screen. "Now, if we look at this example, here the pilot doesn't turn, but banks the viper at 45 degrees and drops the tail sharply, bringing the ship around to a position which allowed the enemy to be engaged immediately." There was a gasp of appreciation around the room at the deceptive simplicity of what was obviously a very difficult move. Lee grinned at the looks of enlightenment on the faces of the pilots.

"Attention on deck," was called as someone spotted him at the back of the room.

"At ease. Lieutenant Thrace you're needed in the commander's briefing room."

"Take a break guys. We'll resume at 1500," she said as she followed her husband out of the room.

"What's up?"

"Looks like what the raptor spotted may be some sort of Cylon base. The commander wants to discuss tactical options and requested your free-thinking presence."

"Glad to know I can still be useful for something!" He chose to ignore this comment.

"That was a nice move you were showing them. One of yours?"

"No. One of yours actually." He looked at her in surprise and she went on "you were always an incredibly precise and efficient pilot, Lee, but I've been observing you over the last few months and you've added something extra, a certain elegant flair to your technique. It's quite beautiful to watch."

Only Kara would find combat moves in a viper beautiful, but this was high praise indeed coming from her. He grabbed her hand and kissed it.

"You must be rubbing off on me!"

−

As they entered the briefing room, Kara looked around and saw that all the usual suspects were gathered. Lieutenant Gaeta was fixing the projector so that some aerial photographs taken by the raptor were displayed on the big screen.

"As you can see, commander, the ships parked here and here are definitely raiders, indicating that there is a Cylon presence on this planet."

"Noted, Lieutenant. The small size of the facility and the fact that the raiders are parked out in the open would seem to indicate that this is an isolated outpost. Would you agree Mr Gaeta?"

"Yes sir. There doesn't seem to be room to house a large force and the huge telescopes and antennae would indicate a listening post."

"So gentlemen, Kara, suggestions for our next move?"

"Can't we just give it a wide berth and fly around it?"

"That would be the best option, Saul, but we don't know the range of their tracking equipment. They could have picked up the raptor, even the fleet itself; even now they could be transmitting our position to the Cylon fleet. We can't take that risk. This base must be destroyed."

"Won't that give the Cylons a pretty clear indication that we've been here?" Asked Lee.

"Yes it would major, but if we can get in and out quickly and then jump away they shouldn't have any means of tracking us. Lieutenant Gaeta, how are the calculations going for a jump from this system."

"They're coming on sir. I can't guarantee that it will be safe to jump very far."

"Any reasonable jump will do, Lieutenant."

Kara had been studying the photographs carefully while all of this had been going on. She spoke up at last.

"How do we know that this is it, sir? Did the raptor survey the whole planet? There could be a frakking great base full of Cylons on the other side."

"Good point, Lieutenant." He looked at Lee who shook his head.

"They got out of there as soon as they saw the base. I'll organise another survey patrol right away, sir."

"No, let's wait until we're ready to go. If it comes back clear then we send the vipers straight in. No point in giving them too much time to get prepared. What sort of firepower do you think you'll need to destroy it, major?"

"Ten vipers sir. Even with only conventional warheads that should do it. The rest of the squadron can patrol the fleet just in case more Cylons do arrive." He glanced at Kara, almost for corroboration of his opinion. She nodded in agreement.

"You'll have to fly in low. They're not unprotected." She pointed to the pictures "see? Ground to air defences here and here, but it looks like they're set up for a direct attack, not one coming in through this valley. That's the entry route I'd take."

"All right, you know the drill people. Do your jobs and hopefully this will be the last we see of the bastards for a while."

−

Kara awoke and realised that the other side of the bed was empty. Glancing at the clock told her that it was 2am. The op began at 7am and she knew that Lee really needed to sleep before then. She levered herself out of the bed and went in search of her husband. She found him on the hanger deck staring at his viper.

"Hey there Adama. Thought I'd find you here."

"Hey yourself, what are you doing up? I thought I'd managed to get out without waking you."

"You did, but your son had other ideas! Have you satisfied yourself that your viper is still here Lee? What's up? This is a pretty sane plan for once."

"Yeah I know, but I just have this bad feeling about it. I don't know why; may be it's just the middle of the night before an op jitters." He took her hand in his "I really wish you were coming with us. I'd feel so much better if you were in the viper next to me."

"Yeah, well remember that the next time you have an emotional melt down and get horny." That made him laugh, but it was a bit half-hearted.

"Why do we keep doing it, Kara? Why? Our whole universe has collapsed around us yet we keep fighting it."

She took his hand and placed it on her belly where the baby had just kicked. "That's why Lee. For our children; so that they have a chance to grow up knowing the same kind of freedom that we did. Hopefully, if we succeed tomorrow we'll have a real chance of that."

He lowered his head and rested his cheek on the top of her belly so that he could hear her heartbeat and feel the strong movements of their son within her. She stroked his hair with a gentle hand and hoped that he was ready to get some rest.

Above them, the commander watched the scene below him with a smile. He walked quietly away, happy that his son now had someone else to get him through the sleeplessness of the pre-op night. He would give him the lucky lighter in the morning.

−

Kara was getting ready to go to CIC the next morning when she felt the first pain. She ignored it, assuming it was another one of the false contractions she had been having on and off for the last few days. Lee had already gone to do the pre-flight briefing and she needed to get to her station to make sure that they were collecting all the relevant data on the mission. By the time that she was seated behind her console in CIC the same thing had happened twice more and she was starting to wonder whether this might actually be the real thing.

"Well little one, you do pick your moments. Obviously in a hurry to help mommy and daddy fight the Cylons!"

She surreptitiously watched the clock to time the contractions and did her best not to show her discomfort. She was doing a pretty good at hiding it from everyone but her father-in-law. His eagle eye picked up her glances at the clock and suppressed grimaces. He went over to speak to her.

"Everything all right lieutenant?"

"Fine sir."

"Don't try and fool me, Kara. How long?" He asked quietly.

"Only about an hour. It's not bad yet; I'm fine. If you don't mind sir I'd like to stay here and keep busy. I'd go nuts down in sickbay wondering what was going on, not knowing if…if he was coming back or not." She said, remembering Lee's unaccountable fears last night. He nodded in acceptance.

"I'm relying on your judgement. I don't want anyone's concentration around here disrupted. Nor do I want you to put yourself or the baby at risk. Understand?"

"Perfectly, sir!" she replied with a salute. He rested his hand on hers for a moment.

"And lieutenant, he is coming back," he said with an assurance that she hoped that he felt.

They were interrupted by Crashdown's voice coming over the radio.

"Galactica, this is raptor 324 reporting. Nothing on that planet but the base we saw before."

"Roger that Crashdown, message acknowledged," replied Dee. Colonel Tigh looked to the commander who nodded in return. He picked up the microphone.

"Launch vipers."

−

The formation of ten vipers left the Galactica behind and sped towards the Cylon base. They were all armed with two missiles from Galactica's precious, dwindling stores. As they approached the planet, Apollo split the team into three: two attack groups of four and a back up team just in case they needed some extra fire power to finish the job off. He took charge of the first attack run whilst the others ran cover for them. As Kara had predicted, the ground to air defence guns had started firing as soon as the vipers got near. He swung his viper round and headed down into the valley below the base, the rest of his team following in close formation. As they got closer in to the base Apollo dropped his ship down below the flak. The four raiders which had been parked by the base had taken off and were heading towards them on an intercept course. His second squad were coming round to engage them. Knowing they would keep him clear, he focused on the target. However his focus was somewhat distracted when the supposed landing strip that the raiders had been parked on pulled back and more raiders started to pour out.

"Uh, Galactica this is Apollo. We're going to need you to send the cavalry. We've got a full squadron of raiders here."

"Roger that Apollo. Cavalry on its way." The atmosphere in CIC tensed a few notches with Apollo's announcement.

"OK people pull in tight to me. We need to do it and we need to do it fast before those guys can catch up with us. I don't want to see any missiles not hitting their target."

"Frak!"

"What's up Hotdog?"

"Fuselage took a hit. Frakking bit of shrapnel got me in the leg."

"Are you OK to continue?"

"Course boss, wouldn't miss a chance to blow up a Cylon base because of a little bit of shrapnel!"

The vipers dipped down over the target, firing their missiles into their designated buildings. Apollo took out the antennae and Hotdog the telescopes. Striker and Kat got the first hit on the actual base.

"Nice shooting guys. Ace, you and your team go next and finish it off. We'll cover you."

After the second run the entire base was a blazing ruin, but they had lost two vipers and still had the raiders to contend with. Even with the rest of the squadron arriving they were outnumbered two to one, but Kara's training was definitely paying off.

"Galactica, Apollo, target destroyed. Engaging Cylon raiders."

The atmosphere in CIC had lightened considerably since Apollo's last message, but everyone stuck to their tasks as the fight continued. The tinny voices of the pilots drifted around the CIC.

"Nice shooting, Apollo, thanks!"

"Any time, Striker. Now let's finish these guys off and get out of here."

"With you there boss."

"Watch out Ace, there's one on your tail!"

"Concentrate on your own tail Kat, and I'll worry about mine."

"Anyone got any ammo left? I'm just about out."

"Those of you low on fuel and ammo head back to Galactica. Job's just about done."

"Roger that CAG."

More general chit chat flowed back and forth, and then a calm voice the commander instantly recognised caught his attention.

"I'm hit."

"Can you make it back Apollo?" Came the concerned voice of another pilot.

"Negative. I've lost the starboard engine and both thrusters. You guys get back to Galactica and tell the chief that I'm going to have quite a bit of work for him." His voice was still calm despite the obvious seriousness of his situation. Kara, who had come to stand by the commander's side, made a small whimpering noise which he knew wasn't from the pain of any contraction. He quietly slipped his hand over hers where they were gripping the console, knuckles already white.

"Frak that, Apollo we can't leave you!"

"Get back to the ship, that's an order. You're too far away from me and we can't risk loosing any more vipers. Galactica, Apollo, my ship is disabled. Requesting retrieval by raptor once the area is secure."

"Roger that, Apollo. We'll be with you as soon as we can." Dee's voice sounded a little more concerned than usual.

"Oh shit! Where did they come from?"

Two more raiders appeared. They were heading directly for Apollo's stranded ship. Everyone in CIC watched the screen in horror, knowing what was about to happen. The commander's arm went around Kara, willing her to be strong. They could do nothing but watch the screen and listen to the interplay of the pilot's comms.

"Apollo, get the hell out of there."

"I only wish I could."

−

**Author's note:** How wicked of me is that? I promise not to leave you in suspense too long. Decided to split the chapter after all. Next one will definitely be the last one!


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter 14**

As the Cylon raiders sped towards him, Apollo managed to take out the ship heading directly for him, but couldn't do anything about the one that had spun off to come up on him from behind. The missile lock warning signal went off in his cockpit. He knew that his luck had finally run out. He sent a small prayer to the Gods to protect his family and whispered "I love you, Kara" as he waited for the inevitable explosion.

In the CIC, the commander held Kara as she sagged against him, her face anguished. Neither of them wanted to watch the screens to see the final explosion, but it was almost harder to look away.

Suddenly, there was a loud "yee-ha" across the comms. "Take that you bastard!" Hotdog had somehow managed to double back in time to take out the missile and the last raider.

"You're all clear Apollo!"

"Hotdog, you mad son of a bitch, that was too close; I thought I was a goner."

"Hey, anytime boss!"

"We might need to have to chat about disobeying orders though."

"Sure sir, but honestly, I'm much more afraid of Starbuck than I am of you, and she would have had my ass if I'd left you there to die."

"You hear that Starbuck?" said Lee with a laugh, knowing that she would probably be in the CIC. "I'm going to have to review your role as flight instructor if this is how they end up."

"Stupid frak," Kara muttered through her tears so that only the commander could hear. "Owww" she rubbed her belly as a stronger contraction than any as yet caught her breath.

"Kara?" The commander still had his arm around her and had felt her wince.

"Really, I'm OK," she said, breathing deeply. "I'm not going anywhere until I've seen him," she said quietly. The commander nodded, knowing that he was a little the same way. He wouldn't quite believe that Lee had escaped in one piece until he saw him in the flesh.

"Dee, have Major Adama report to CIC as soon as he gets back to the ship."

Twenty minutes later the major bounded into CIC, still on an adrenaline high from the victory and being snatched from the jaws of death. He saw Kara and desperately wanted just to hug and kiss her, but was enough in control to realise that wasn't appropriate behaviour in CIC. Instead he saluted the commander.

"Mission accomplished sir," he said, an ear-to ear grin plastered on his face, as he tossed the silver lighter back to his father.

"Well done major. Report." The commander's calm tone brought Lee back down a little and he gave him his brief report of the mission. Whilst he was doing so the commander caught a glimpse of Kara out of the corner of his eye. She was biting her bottom lip in an effort not to cry out in pain and he knew that it was time to let Lee become a husband instead of an officer.

"Thank you, that will be all, major. Now can I suggest that you get your wife to sickbay before she gives birth to my grandson in the middle of CIC!"

"What? Kara?" Lee immediately spun around and rushed over to Kara.

"Oh don't fuss Lee, it's not that bad. He's only winding you up, you stupid frak; it won't be for ages yet."

"Why didn't you tell me that it had started?" She gave him an exasperated look.

"Well I didn't want to bother you as you seemed rather busy trying to getting yourself killed. Now shut up and help me down to sickbay or so help me I'll punch your lights out right here."

Lee didn't need a second invitation!

−

A while later the commander phoned down to sickbay to speak with Major Cottle, ostensibly to get a status report on the casualties from the operation, but this was really a cover for what he really wanted to know about.

"How's she doing?" the major just laughed.

"Much better than her husband at the moment!"

"Hey give him a break; he's had a hard day. He almost didn't make it back you know."

"So I gather."

"I bet she's laying into him real good."

"Yeah, I caught something in the tirade about his flying being worse than one of her nuggets. Abusing her husband seems to be Kara's preferred form of pain relief. Seems to be working pretty well at the moment too!"

"Well let me know when it's getting close, I want to be there."

"Sure will, we'll probably all need relief by that point! I'm keeping my more impressionable staff away so their vocabularies don't get expanded with words I'd rather they didn't know! It won't be for a good while yet though; this baby doesn't seem to be in any hurry to be born."

The commander returned the phone to its rest and turned to Tigh.

"Well Bill it's been one hell of a day and there's still more to come for you so why don't you turn in for a bit," said the XO

"Thanks, Saul." He rested a hand on his old friend's shoulder. "She's your ship colonel."

−

Alexander William Adama made his first appearance in the world at 6.13am the next morning. Now, two hours later, Major Lee Adama sat in a chair next to the sickbay bed in which his wife slept, his newly born son cradled in his arms. The medical staff had tried to get him to put the baby in his crib, but Lee wasn't having any of it. He had come so close to not being here for this moment that he wasn't going to be parted from his son anytime soon.

As he gazed down at the tiny blond head poking out of the blanket, he thought that he had been through just about every possible human emotion in the last 24 hours since he had first climbed into his viper yesterday morning. The encounter with the Cylons, coming so close to ending his life, had been followed by a long vigil at his wife's side. The doc had said that Kara's labour had been perfectly normal, but all he knew was that it had seemed to go on forever and had obviously been intensely painful for her. He had felt helplessly inadequate in the face of his inability to help her get any relief and he had to just watch her struggle through it, not able to offer much more than a hand to hold and comforting words. He became acutely aware of the very inadequate facilities there were on the Galactica for this type of medical need in comparison with what she could have had if they had been back on Caprica. But once the baby had been born you wouldn't have known what she had been through, such was the joy on her face as she held her new son. There had been tears all round; Lee was pretty sure that even his father had had a bit of a moist eye. He had certainly choked up when they had told him the baby's name. They had wanted their son to have a name of his own, not to be named for someone to whom he would always be compared, so they had given him the name of the Caprican god of peace, which seemed even more appropriate now than when they had first chosen it. However, neither of them had been able to resist the urge to include his grandfather's name as well.

Despite their residual fears about the possible after effects of Kara's trip to Caprica, the baby was perfect. Lee hadn't had much experience with children, but as he touched one tiny fist gently with his own finger, only to have it gripped in return, he felt an overwhelming surge of emotion for the tiny life he held. Kara had been right. All the efforts to fight the Cylons over the past year and a bit were worth it just for this moment; the beginning of a new human life, created in the midst of war.

−

The president of the colonies was pacing her office waiting for Commander Adama to arrive. They had taken to doing a joint press conference the day after major military operations, but this time the commander hadn't turned up at the scheduled time and was now over three hours late. No explanation had come from the Galactica. The press were kicking their heels in the briefing room, no doubt making up all kinds of conjecture as to the reason for the delay, and she was getting increasingly angry. She had been intending to announce his appointment to the position of admiral of the fleet at this press conference, but now she was having second thoughts. At last the door opened and the commander casually walked in.

"You're rather late, commander!" The president's voice clearly conveying her annoyance "I hate to keep the press waiting; it always makes them suspect something's going on that they don't know about."

"My apologies, Madame President," said Adama, an amused smile on his face at her impatience. He took her hand and kissed it gallantly, "but I was rather busy with something important that couldn't wait." He continued to smile at her. Who was this and what had he done with commander Adama? She was pretty sure that he wasn't a Cylon, but you could never be too sure these days.

"May I know what it was?"

"Yes you may," he replied, the huge smile still in place. He walked over to her white board, took the eraser and rubbed out the "8" at the end of the current population number and wrote in a "9". She clapped her hands together in delight, all her anger forgotten.

"Kara's had the baby! Oh congratulations, commander."

"Yes, I'm now officially an old man!"

−

Hotdog limped over to the area of sickbay where he knew they had put Kara and stuck his head around the curtain. The CAG was sprawled in a chair next to the bed, obviously fast asleep, with his son sleeping peacefully in his arms. Kara, surprisingly awake, lay in the bed just watching them.

"Congratulations, Starbuck," he said quietly.

"Hotdog! Hey, come over here." She turned to him and beckoned with a finger for him to get closer. She slapped him lightly on the cheek.

"That's for disobeying orders and for getting shot." Then she pulled him down closer and kissed him, "and that's for making sure that my husband came back alive."

"It was nothing, sir, just doing my job." Hotdog was embarrassed.

"No, it wasn't nothing, Hotdog. Look at that." She gestured towards Lee and the baby. "You did that, Hotdog; you made sure that Lee got to see his son born and that my little boy got to meet his daddy. Nothing can ever take that away from them now and you gave it to them. That's why we do what we do every day. You should be very proud." Her eyes were bright with tears.

"Oh frak, Starbuck, you're gonna make me all emotional."

"I won't tell if you don't!"

−

As Hotdog left Kara went back to watching Lee and the baby. She felt a great love swell up in her for both of them. Before she had gotten pregnant, and she and Lee had finally gotten together, she had been unsure whether she really had the capacity or even emotional ability to love. Now her whole perspective had changed. When she had been with Zac, she had loved him with all the capacity that she had at the time, but she realised now how small and immature that love had been in comparison with what she felt for Lee. The intense love she already felt for her child was further proof that she had changed beyond all recognition from the woman who had first stepped on to the Galactica after Zac's death.

She didn't have too long to carry on these reflections because it wasn't long before little Alex showed that he had other ideas about letting his father sleep. What had started out as small whimpers soon turned into full blown cries, waking Lee quickly.

"Lords, he's going to keep the whole ship awake if he's that loud all the time," he said as he offered the baby to Kara. She took him and placed him at her breast as the nurse had told her. This was a tense moment. It wasn't that she was terribly keen on the idea of breast feeding, but it was just a necessity. If the baby wouldn't feed from his mother then they were in trouble: baby milk and formula were virtually non-existent in the fleet. Fortunately, Alex knew a good thing when he saw it and began to suckle greedily. While he fed Kara took the opportunity to look at him critically.

"Well one thing's for certain, you wouldn't have been able to deny he was yours even if you wanted to: he looks just like you but in miniature. If it wasn't for the fact that I vividly recall giving birth to him I'd say I had nothing to do with this baby at all."

Lee was sitting on the side of the bed watching. On arm around Kara's shoulders, he caressed his son's downy blond head with a gentle finger.

"Oh, I don't know. That blond hair had to come from you and who knows, he may turn out to be just like you in other ways."

"Lords help us if he does!" Lee laughed lightly, but his expression quickly turned more serious.

"Can you believe that we made it here, Kara?"

"Not really, but I'm not going to think too hard about it right now. I'm just going to send a prayer to the Lords to thank them that we are and that Alex is here and he's healthy."

"So say we all," replied Lee with feeling. "I'm so proud of you. Now I know why the women have the babies; I couldn't have done what you did today. I'm just so sorry there wasn't more I could do to make it easier for you."

"You were there, that was the most important thing to me." She looked up at him, her eyes bright. He bent to kiss her and their tears mingled with the kiss. There was no need for words to convey what they felt at that moment. They both knew that they were beyond blessed to still both be alive, to be together and in love and to have the chance to raise a child. Despite everything that had gone on in their frakked up universe, nothing beyond these simple facts really mattered to them.

**THE END**

−

**Author's note**: That's it, finished! Hoped you like the sappy ending. The sad one was even sappier but I've been living in fear and trembling of Moonwhisper's pink granny slippers and the various other threats for the last few days so couldn't bring myself to do it! So, in the words of the great Starbuck "You've been fun, you've been a great audience; dismissed!"


End file.
